Raising an Army
by ICanStopAnytime
Summary: The survivors attempt to piece together the mystery of the island and raise an army to confront Dharma. Features Sayid, Ana, Charlie, Sawyer, Jack, Locke, and Eko. Partially parallels Season 2 episodes and fills in missing scenes, partially AU.
1. Chapter 1

**Chapter One**

"I hear you are trying to raise an army." Sayid folded his arms across his chest and glanced at the stick tied with white cloth to her side. What did she think she could accomplish with that? She wasn't Eko. She had the will, surely, but not the strength.

"Where'd you hear that?" Ana Lucia answered, head cocked to the side.

"When you and Jack ask a dozen people if they are interested in joining you, word travels."

"Yeah. I guess it does." Ana sat down on a fallen tree stump.

It wasn't clear what she had been doing in this part of the jungle. Gathering fruit, it looked like. At least she knew how to make herself useful, Sayid thought. "Why did you not come to me first?" he asked. "You are aware, I presume, that I was a soldier?"

Ana nodded. "We didn't think you'd be interested."

"And why is that?"

Ana ran her tongue across her lips and looked off in the distance. "You were preoccupied." She mustered the courage to look back at him. "So are you? Interested?"

"If there is to be an army," insisted Sayid, "I will raise it. And I will train it. You may join it, if you wish. I know you have not forgotten the way the Others took the children; I know you have not forgotten either their cunning or their ruthlessness. You remember keenly. You may be one of the few who _truly_ remembers."

She had carried that knowledge with her, hadn't she? She had nursed the hate, like he was nursing it now. It had consumed her. It had made her rash. It had made her shoot Shannon. It had also made her save Bernard and Libby. And maybe that hatred could save the children, maybe it could help Sayid claim the vengeance he coveted.

"Of course I haven't forgotten." Ana looked at him defiantly and brushed a wisp of black hair from her face. "But I don't need training."

"I beg to differ. So, I am sure, would Shannon, if she were alive to do so."

Ana pursed her lips and her eyes grew hard. But she didn't say he was wrong. "Fine then, I'll learn from you. But there isn't much sense training without guns."

"I will have the guns." Sayid finally let his arms fall to his side. "I will have them by tomorrow morning."

Ana didn't voice her doubt. If Sayid thought he could get the guns back from Sawyer, maybe he could. At any rate, he didn't much look like he wanted to be gainsaid.

Ana had heard about Gale. Sayid had beat him badly; it was worse that than what she'd done to Nathan, and he had even convinced Locke to help him do it. That was clever work, Ana thought. But Sayid hadn't learned anything. He'd just learned what he probably knew already—that Gale was lying.

Ana had heard, too, that Jack had pulled Sayid kicking from the interrogation room. She liked Jack, but the truth was, she didn't much respect him. He was fun to flirt with, a nice guy, a break from the brazen world about her, a break from her own hardness. But in the end, she didn't really believe he couldn't be depended on to do what had to be done. He was weak. If she was going to go after the Others, she'd much rather be following Sayid than Jack. Of course, she'd rather not follow anyone.

Her thoughts were interrupted when Sayid asked, "Who have you recruited thus far?"

She ticked off the names of six interested people, besides Jack and herself.

"Locke said no?" Sayid asked.

"I didn't ask Locke. Neither did Jack."

"You did not ask Locke? You did not ask me? The two best shots on the island, the best tracker, and the only soldier. What are you and Jack playing at? Were you planning a tea party before you set off into the jungle?"

Ana's lip twisted into an unattractive snarl. She didn't answer.

"What about Eko?" Sayid asked.

"He said no."

"To you. I will ask him again. And Charlie will join us. Maybe Locke, if I can dislodge him from the button. Did you ask Kate?"

"No."

Sayid sighed loudly. "So you and Jack did not ask anyone of note? I would not expect you to know the relative skills of the survivors here, but Jack ought to know. I suppose he did not want rivalry. He is not as reluctant to lead as he pretends to be."

By now Ana had surmised that Jack didn't like to be challenged. But then, neither did she. Neither did Sayid, she suspected, when it came to it. Locke—Locke was a wild card, a calm and quiet one, but an uncertain one nonetheless. He made her uneasy. She didn't know why, but she hadn't wanted to mention the army to him. But it wasn't her army anymore, was it?

"Meet me here tomorrow morning," commanded Sayid. "And we will begin our work."

He didn't wait for her affirmation before turning and walking silently back through the jungle.


	2. Chapter 2

**Chapter Two**

Sayid took a seat in the sand next to Charlie, who sat with his knees pulled to his chest and his head burrowed down like a small beetle digging blindly in the dirt. The light from Charlie's private fire did not enliven his features, which were shrouded by the hood of his sweatshirt. Sayid glanced at the peculiar adornment with something like annoyance, and Charlie pushed it down away from his face. "So?" asked Charlie.

"Ana will join the army. I have not spoken to Locke because I do not want him involved until I have the guns." Sayid was still wary from Locke's recent betrayal, and he knew the man would have insisted on knowing Sayid's plan for regaining the guns. Sayid would rather have them in his possession before seeking Locke's assistance. He was fairly confident he could convince Locke to join them, once a schedule had been set for tending to the button in his absence and once reliable people had been selected for the task. And though he was confident of Locke's assistance, that did not precisely mean he trusted the man.

"Eko?" Charlie asked.

"I am not talking to anyone else until I have the guns. I should not even have spoken to Ana. That was a mistake. She may mention it to Jack, although I do not think she will. She is not ready to relinquish control yet. She will not want Jack to know about the guns until I have them either."

"What, and then she'll try to get you to give them up to her?" Charlie asked in disbelief.

"No. But she will try to maneuver a more commanding role for herself." Sayid reached out and rubbed his hands before the fire. It felt good. His eyes melted into the dancing flames; there was something mesmerizing about the way the fire crackled and flickered, something fiercely beautiful about the purging heat that leapt and weaved. The fire consumed the wood, little by little, grasping for life, not subdued by the breeze but growing with the air. "Come by my tent in three hours. Everyone should be sleeping soundly. Once you take me to the guns, you can leave."

"You don't need help moving them?"

Sayid looked away from the fire and surveyed Charlie's face. It had become so worn. "No."

"Where are you putting them?" Charlie asked.

"You do not need to know that."

Charlie toyed nervously with his index finger, twisting it left and right. Yesterday, Sayid had spoken to him about the Others, had reminded him of what they had done to Claire—as though he needed reminding. Charlie had been surprised by the attention Sayid had shown him, surprised that the Iraqi would come to him seeking affirmation for anything. And when Sayid had said that he obtained no useful information from Gale because of Locke's betrayal, Charlie had replied before he could stop himself, "Locke's a fool, and I'm glad I finally made him look like one."

When the words were out, he had looked away from Sayid, but he couldn't think fast enough. He could feel the eyes of the interrogator fixed on his profile. And then Sayid had asked, "What do you mean, Charlie?" After that, the questions had kept flowing, and Charlie had been helpless to withhold the truth.

The musician now asked, "You won't tell anyone that I helped Sawyer, will you?"

"You need not concern yourself with my silence," Sayid replied, rising from the sand. "Once Sawyer discovers the guns are gone, he will know you played a part."

Charlie's tongue darted out of his mouth. He pulled it back in, raking it against his teeth. "What if I change my mind? What if I don't show you where they are?"

Sayid looked down at him. "Do you really want to know the answer to that, Charlie?" he asked coolly.

Charlie swallowed hard and looked down at the ground. He didn't have to say no. Sayid knew he would take him to the guns, and Charlie knew that Sayid knew it. The musician reached behind his neck in a habitual motion and pulled up his hood.

That night, Sayid lay on his back in the tent and looked up at the dim pattern of the starlight that managed to permeate those few sections of the tarp that were not opaque. As he waited for the time to pass before Charlie arrived, he replayed the last two days in his mind. He had been upset with Locke for not fighting Jack, for letting the doctor in. But now, he was able to admit to himself that Jack's intrusion had been a blessing.

Sayid had not been in control of the interrogation. Gale had begun to manipulate _him_. It was shameful, Sayid thought, the way he had allowed his emotions to master him, the way he had made the questions personal and therefore useless. It was shameful, the way the grief had choked him, not in private, but in the very face of his enemy. It was well that Jack had broken in. How far might Gale have taken his game otherwise? How far downward might Sayid have spiraled in response?

But now he had calmed himself; now he had redirected his mind to the task of defense, rescue, and, yes—he would confess it—revenge. But he would not allow his quest for vengeance to hinge on emotion; the old cliché was trite, but it was trite because it was true: revenge _is_ a dish best served cold. And he would be cold, and calm, and fully in control when he went to question Gale a second time tomorrow—after he had the guns, after he had given Charlie and Ana their first lessons, after he had recruited Eko and Locke and Kate. Gale would tell him what he needed to know to find the children of the tail end, to find Michael, to find Walt, to find the Others. Sayid would do whatever was required to make him tell, and Jack would not long dare to stand in his way.


	3. Chapter 3

**Chapter Three**

Initially, they made their way by moonlight into the jungle. Once they were obscured by the foliage, Sayid lit a torch, and he urged Charlie on. He followed but three steps behind and noted how every leaf, every branch, every fallen dead thing seemed to crunch beneath Charlie's feet. Finally he asked, "How did you manage to follow Locke and avoid discovery?" Locke was a hunter. Surely he could sense when he was being hunted, especially when his stalker lacked stealth.

Charlie shrugged. "I tried to be quiet."

"I cannot understand how Locke did not perceive you."

"He was preoccupied with the guns," Charlie answered. "He wasn't paying attention."

Sayid appeared doubtful. Charlie shot him an annoyed glance. Then he asked, "Why didn't you notice Ana, and Eko, and Libby, and Bernard before they—"

Sayid had been looking momentarily at the ground below them, and now he jerked his head abruptly upward and caught Charlie's eyes. He saw the sudden fear growing there as Charlie hastened to say, "I'm sorry. I didn't mean—"

Sayid said nothing, but he motioned the musician to resume leading him to the guns. Charlie was right. Four people had been approaching him, and he had not observed any of them until it was too late. He, too, had been preoccupied. This thought made his caution rise. If Locke could be ignorant of Charlie, if he himself could be ignorant of four strangers…Sayid's eyes began to dart mechanically in every direction as he walked, taking in the whole scene. He touched Charlie's shoulder, urging him to stop, and placed a finger to his lips to indicate silence. And for a moment, he listened to the jungle.

Certain no one was following them, he motioned Charlie on, unable to stop thinking about his failure of observance that rainy night in the jungle, followed by his failure of discipline during the interrogation. He had failed Shannon too, but the guilt did not overtake him for that. It was not that _that_ was a lesser failure; it was simply harder to admit, and admitting it even once had already resulted in a lack of control. So he thought of how he had failed himself, of how he had failed to be a fit soldier. And he watched Charlie move reluctantly before him, his hands shoved deep in the pockets of his ever-present sweatshirt.

They walked for quite some time before Charlie bent to the ground and began digging through a pile of fallen earthy debris. At first he merely shifted through the leaves and branches, but soon his sorting grew frantic. He bent over and began violently throwing the jungle's refuse from the pile. Sayid moved the crackling torch in one seamless motion across the entire area, enlightening Charlie's handiwork and revealing nothing but the ground.

Charlie looked up at Sayid; in the torchlight, his eyes were pools of fear. "I swear they were here. I swear they were here. I swear--"

Sayid wondered why Charlie was so afraid. The musician had really been willing to believe that Sayid would harm him if he did not reveal the location of the guns, and Charlie seemed terrified of reprisal now that they were not where he had said they would be. The other survivors, too, had glanced at Sayid nervously over the past day. What had the wind of rumor brought to camp? What, exactly, did they all think he had done to Gale?

Sayid held the torch a little closer to Charlie to ensure that he could read the musician's eyes. "Might you be mistaken? Might it have been somewhere else?"

"No," Charlie answered, his voice somewhat tremulous. "I helped bury them myself. They were here."

"Did you speak to Sawyer today?"

"No, Sayid, of course not."

Charlie was more afraid of him than he was of Sawyer. What did that tell the Iraqi? Sayid tried not to consider the implications. He lowered the torch to the ground and examined it for any trace evidence of the guns. "Sawyer has moved them again," he declared. "He did not trust you, as well he should not have. He is no fool. But I have been too optimistic."

He motioned for Charlie to rise and turned back towards camp. Charlie trailed behind him, head bent. Eventually, he drew up beside Sayid and asked, "What are you going to do now then?"

"That is not your concern," he answered, looking blankly ahead and occasionally to the side. When he turned his watchful eyes to the right, he caught Charlie's gaze. "Why do you look at me as though I were a ticking time bomb?" he asked.

Charlie turned away. He thrust his hands again into the pockets. "Aren't you though, Sayid?"

Sayid allowed Charlie to walk on in silence without rebuttal. The Iraqi thought the survivors had once had confidence in him. Had they lost it? How was he going to lead an army if he was feared more than he was respected? But then, who trusted anyone in this place anymore? Who could possibly demand loyalty now?

Weeks ago Sayid had known happiness for the first time in years. The grim mysteries of the island had seemed to fade into the background. Redemption had no longer appeared as a phantasm to be painfully pursued, but as a real possibility to be possessed.

But that was all over now. Charlie had done horrible things; Sayid even suspected he had been somehow responsible for Sun's injury. Sawyer—despite his temporary, affected near pleasantness—had not been moving gradually towards reformation after all; he had only been plotting his revenge. Locke was obsessed with the button, and it had become his god. Jack was always vying for control, seemingly unwilling to lead and yet terrified of sharing leadership. Ana was rash and undisciplined and bent on getting a gun, even while inclined to shoot blindly. And Sayid himself…

He shook his head. There was no trust, no faith, no love, no loyalty, no levity, no peace on this island now. Whatever anchor had kept them temporarily at bay had been wrenched free in the night. Civilization had ruptured and the pieces were floating fast apart, and who would accept the task of patching them together again, if they were ever really together at all?


	4. Chapter 4

**Chapter Four**

Back in his tent, Sayid began digging in the sand where he had buried the hunting knife he had borrowed from Locke the week before. He had said he needed it to cut some rope for a shelter he was helping to build, and he had indeed needed it for that. But he had kept it, and Locke had been too preoccupied with the the guns to ask for its return.

Sayid half-smiled, grimly, as he considered how much reverence Locke had for the guns, as though even in their inanimate state their power was somehow fierce and holy, as if keeping them in his own protective hands could stave off the cancer that was growing all around them. Yet what Sayid could do with this knife, what Eko could do with a mere stick, what Sawyer could do with his cunning…

Sayid tested the blade, and when he found it too dull, he sharpened it against a stone. Under the blanket of night he made his way to Sawyer's tent. Before approaching the sleeping man he surveyed the shelter, to see if Sawyer had kept one of the guns near by. He had not. The con man's power lay in knowing where they were, not in wielding them, and he had been wise not to keep one long for himself, lest someone should take it and challenge him.

Sayid turned the knife in his hand to better position the blade, and he thought, for a moment, that the handle trembled in his grasp. He did not like what he was about to do. He had tortured Sawyer once already; he had broken his promise to never resume that abandoned trade. He had dishonored the memory of the woman who had first inspired him to change, and the guilt had sent him roaming.

He had not felt that guilt after Gale. He had been wrong about Sawyer and the medicine, but even if he had not been wrong, Sayid might still have left the camp. But with Gale…with Gale matters were quite different. Sawyer, for all his failings, was one of their own, one of the survivors. Gale was a part of some greater, merciless force that threatened to destroy them all, and remorse was a luxury Sayid could not afford if he wanted to preserve what was now the only home and the only family left to him in this world.

He was startled by his own thoughts. Was that what this now lifeless place had become? Home? Was that what these once-strangers were to him? His own? But what else could they be? There had been no rescue and no sign of rescue, and the survivors had only one another. That, after all, was why he had returned after his first encounter with Danielle.

Sayid did not like Sawyer, and there were others he distrusted or disliked. But he could not choose his fellow survivors anymore than he could choose who his brothers or sisters might be. And if the survivors were either too sensitive or too indifferent to defend themselves against the Others, then the duty must fall on Sayid. They might await the slaughter like sheep, hoping their silence and subservience would shelter them from those they had not provoked, those who had already taken nearly a dozen. But he would not leave the herd defenseless.

Sayid pressed the blade to the Southerner's neck, and Sawyer did no more than open a single eye. When he saw Sayid, he opened the other eye, and a slow, irenic smile stole across his face, forcing the skin about his cheeks to dimple. Sayid supposed there was many a woman who found those dimples attractive rather than merely annoying. The Iraqi would have thought they were affected, if he thought a man could control his own appearance in that way.

"Well, well," said Sawyer in a drawl that was thicker than usual, "if it isn't the noble savage."

Sayid pressed the blade tighter against the exposed flesh of Sawyer's neck. "Take me to the guns."

"Or what?"

"You know what."

When Sawyer smiled this time, his tongue protruded slightly from his lips, and a low laugh rumbled up from his chest. "Everyone is terrified of you, Torquemada. They say you lost it with that gentleman from Minnesota. They say you snapped his pinky off with a pair of pliers."

Sawyer could see Sayid's eyes cringe in the dim light of the fire still half-burning outside the tent. "Me…me on the other hand," Sawyer said as he licked his smiling lips, "I'm going to call your bluff."

It gave Sawyer great satisfaction to see the surprise cloud Sayid's features. And though the Iraqi pressed the blade a little tighter, drawing the tiniest drop of blood, Sawyer did not flinch. But when Sayid drew the blade away completely and sat back across from Sawyer, the cowboy didn't gloat. He pulled himself into a sitting position, and his smile faded and his face grew firm.

For awhile, they just looked at one another, not speaking. Finally, Sayid asked, "What do you want in exchange for the guns?"

"There's nothing you could offer me. The only thing I want from you is your humiliation." Sawyer thought of the way Sayid had stared at him when he had shot that gun into the air to proclaim his reign. He thought of how the Iraqi's self-righteous eyes had drilled into his own. And he knew that Sayid had felt vindicated; he knew Sayid had thought, W_hy should we ever have expected anything more of him?_

"Do you know why I want these guns?" Sayid asked.

"Everyone wants them."

"That man I interrogated is an Other. I did no more than beat him." When he said these last words, Sayid bit his bottom lip. He hated that he felt the need to justify himself to Sawyer. He should not have bothered to correct the man's misassumptions. "I can finish my interrogation tomorrow. I can find out where Walt is, where Michael is, where the other children are, and after we train, we can get them back."

"Why should I care?"

"The children," Sayid insisted. "What happened to Claire and Shannon and--"

"Again I ask, why should I care?"

Sayid's own words seemed to come full circle upon him. Sawyer felt as little for his fellow survivors as Sayid had for the populace of Australia. The ex-soldier was unconcerned with the impersonal, teething mass known as humanity. For him, there was only family, tribe, and country; beyond that, there was nothing. But for Sawyer, there was simply nothing.

Sawyer's eyes narrowed. His lips smiled, but his face grimaced. "Do you think that out of the goodness of my heart, I'll hand over the guns to you? Come now, Mohammed, you know I haven't got any heart. You've always known that. Maybe you're the only one who never started believing there was some secret kindness in me. Kate was so willing to believe it. But not you."

Kate _had_ been willing to believe it, Sayid thought. She had _wanted_ to believe it because she saw in Sawyer something of herself, something of her own past, and if Sawyer was capable of reformation, then that meant she was capable too.

"And I know you," Sawyer continued, "I know you've always been a barbarian."

"If you think that, why are you so certain I will not torture you?"

"Because I know you still _believe_ you're civilized."

When Sayid did not rise to this bait, Sawyer let one arm hang casually over his knee as he leaned forward and said, "I'll fight you for them."

"Pardon?"

"I'll fight you for them," Sawyer repeated. "The guns. In the morning. In front of the whole camp. Mano a mano."

"Hand to hand?"

Sawyer snorted. "Good to see you're a translator as well as a torturer."

"I do not understand," said Sayid, and his face revealed his confusion.

"If you win, you can have the guns."

"You want to fight for the guns?" Sayid asked pointedly. "Like schoolboys sparring over insults?"

"Well, Gahndi, it ain't like you never did it before. Back when I accused you of bringing down the plane, you could have just turned the other cheek. Instead, you called me a redneck and took the first swing. So why don't you drop the holier-than-thou attitude and agree to fight me for the guns? Whoever asks for mercy first loses."

Sayid sat quietly for a long while. At last he said, "Very well."

"You haven't asked me what I get if you lose." Sawyer's voice was cold. He hadn't expected Sayid to ask, and yet having that expectation met only fueled his loathing.

"I do not see how I could lose."

"Of course you don't. You think too highly of yourself." When Sawyer and Sayid had fought after the plane crash, the Iraqi had done well, but Sawyer still believed that if they had not been pulled apart, he would eventually have won. Sayid had training and endurance and anger. But how much actual experience did he have? Modern war didn't exactly call for fistfights, but the barroom certainly did. Sawyer had been in countless fights, and he too had endurance. He also had something more powerful than anger—he had spite.

"I was a soldier," Sayid said, "and an interrogator, and I have beaten many men—"

"Men bound to chairs? Men tied to trees? Wispy, middle-aged men from Minnesota?"

Sayid clenched his teeth. But he asked the question Sawyer was waiting for. "What do you get if I lose?"

Sawyer smiled, not a feigned, satirical smile, but a smile almost of genuine delight. "Pure satisfaction," he answered. _And a chance to prove to everyone else that you aren't quite the man you think you are. _

They set a time to meet in the morning, by the shore, and they established some basic ground rules. There weren't many. Sawyer watched Sayid take his knife and leave. He lay back down on his pillow, folding his arms behind his neck, and he smiled like a satiated baby as he drifted off to sleep.


	5. Chapter 5

**Chapter Five**

Sayid awoke at the same time he did every morning, very early. He had never been able to dismantle that internal, soldier's alarm clock, had never been able to enjoy the luxury of sleeping in. He washed his face in a basin of water outside his tent and ran his hands through his thick hair, barely wetting it. The frigid water purged what drowsiness remained in his mind, and he shook the droplets of water off of his hands before pulling his shirt over his head. The sounds of the nearby jungle seemed so much louder at this hour, louder than the almost gentle crashing of the tide against the shore. The tree frogs were exercising their sound lungs this morning, but Sayid let the sound drift into the background as he considered the coming day.

He went to the spot where he had promised to rendezvous with Ana and told her there would be no training that morning. When he explained that he did not yet have the guns and that he would be fighting Sawyer for ownership, she asked, "How do you know he'll even given them to you if you win?"

"He said he would."

Ana laughed. She placed a hand on her hip and looked at the jungle's floor before returning an amused yet condescending countenance to Sayid. "And you trust him?"

Sayid shrugged. "Generally, no. But to keep his word in this matter—yes. It is a bet."

Ana shook her head and murmured, "Boys, boys, boys. So you think the whole camp will be watching?"

"I think Sawyer wants them to. I would rather that not happen."

"Well, it'll happen. This is something _I've_ certainly got to see, anyway. You're certain you can win?"

"What do you think?" Sayid asked, wondering why she had even asked him the question. Wasn't it obvious he would win?

Ana's lip curled slightly. "You're pretty sure of yourself, huh?"

Sawyer's smugness had not given him pause, but this question now did. He would not admit his newborn concern however, certainly not to Ana.

"Why would I not be?" he asked, forcing his face into a rigid cast.

"You been in a lot of fistfights?"

"Not a lot, but I am trained--"

"Well," interrupted Ana, "if I learned anything as a cop, it's that training only prepares you so much for experience. Good luck." She turned and walked back to the beach, leaving him in doubt.

He shook off the uncertainty as he made his way to the designated sparring ground. From the eyes that trailed him as he walked along the beach, he deduced that Sawyer had been canvassing the neighborhood to spread the news of the impending fight. The cowboy must truly believe he was going to win.

When Sayid walked by the tent of Sun and Jin, they both smiled slightly at him, almost as if they were amused. Well, it was better than the medley of fear, distrust, and uncertainty he had seen in most of the castaways' eyes the previous day. Sun leaned back into her husband's arms, and Jin kissed her on the cheek. Sayid thought that he had not been entirely correct to assume that all love and loyalty had been drained from this place. Standing here was a redemption story that had not yet unraveled; here was a sweet reconciliation, rising like the phoenix from the ashes.

And a little further down the shore he spied Rose and Bernard, helping one another to take down clothes from a line. Now there was a woman who had clung to hope when everyone around her had believed she was deluding herself, and her hope had not been futile. She had escaped much suffering in those early days because she had possessed faith. How beautiful it would be to be able to believe in something again, to be able to hope for someone. Hope was a terrible thing to lose, Sayid thought; it could be a manacle, but it could also be a buttress.

At last he passed by Claire, who cuddled her infant son tightly to her chest. The baby rooted against her from instinct, settling with a coo against her breast, an innocent light in a darkening world. Yes, there were things in this camp worth fighting for, things loftier than survival.

He felt the survivors draw in behind him as he continued to walk towards the shore and Sawyer. He resisted the urge to turn and look at the curious trailers. When he reached the designated spot on the shore, he saw that Sawyer had already marked off a ring. And he saw Eko standing on the outskirts of the unholy box, looking unusually stern. The towering man looked down at Sayid and said, "This is a pitiful way to resolve things. But I will referee."

Sayid said nothing and took his place on one end of the ring, while a smirking Sawyer assumed a spot at the other. By now many of the other survivors had arrived and were beginning to hover around. Some, like Hurley, plunked themselves to the ground close by the ring in spectator position. The whole scene felt almost surreal to Sayid, as though he had unexpectedly become an entertainer. It made him quite uneasy, but he tried to block the throng from his mind, and he almost succeeded until Jack's voice broke in from behind the crowd: "What the hell is going on here?"

"Torquemada there is going to fight me for the guns," announced Sawyer loudly, leveling his eyes at Jack as though daring him to crash the party.

"This is ridiculous," said Jack. "Sayid, have you lost your mind? We are civilized people here. We aren't…we aren't…"

"We do what we have to do," said Locke quietly, drawing up behind him. "And if this is what Sayid has to do…"

Jack shook his head in frustration, turned, and stormed off down the beach. Locke, however, took a place among the spectators and looked on with silent interest.

"While we're giving everyone a show…" Sawyer drew off his shirt and threw it on the sand outside of the ring. He knew he looked good, and his posture and smug smile proved it. "How about you, Mohammed?"

Sayid let his arms swing loose at his sides. "No thank you," he replied. "I prefer not to have to wash your blood off my chest." Then Sayid considered that Sawyer might attempt to grab and drag him by the shirt, and he repented his decision. He pulled off his shirt also and tossed it aside.

Sawyer laughed, a fake, drawn out guffaw, and then he glanced at Eko. "Start this thing, why don't you?"

_To be continued…_

------

If you are enjoying this story, you might also like:

--Despair & Hope (Sayid-centric with Ana, Sun, Rose, Sawyer, Kate, Claire, Nadia, Locke, and new characters)

--A Different Kind of Grief (Sayid, Libby, and ensemble case)

--Solitary Retold (from Nadia's point of view) / Escape (the sequel, from Sayid's point of view)

Click on author name for a list of stories.


	6. Chapter 6

**Chapter Six**

Sayid wondered what all of these spectators hoped to see. Some seemed concerned about the impending fight, and they looked on wearily, like those driving by the scene of an ugly accident: not wanting to see but nevertheless drawn inexorably to the sight. Others appeared as though they were expecting to be entertained, expecting, perhaps to imbibe some kind of vicarious thrill from the exchange.

But this was not going to be anything like the movies these people had amused themselves with back home, Sayid thought. There was no pummeling from which a man might return to grasp victory at the last dramatic minute. Whoever made the first rough contact would already have the advantage; whoever got two or three good blows in a row would likely have the eventual victory. And there would be nothing graceful, nothing choreographed here…just uneven stumbling, cacophonous grunts, and base blood. Sawyer had insisted the loser would be the first to plead for mercy, the first to say, "Please stop."

Sayid had implied the fight was sophomoric, but he had agreed to it; and now that he stood awaiting Eko's word, he entirely forgot his former opinion. The adrenaline coursing through his veins drove away all present concern for propriety or morality. He wanted only to fight and to win.

His concentration broke momentarily when he noticed Kate pushing through to emerge from the crowd, one hand grasping tightly the backpack slung about her shoulder. She did not glance at Sawyer with disappointment—perhaps she had given up expecting anything of him since he had taken the guns. Instead, she looked at Sayid in much the same way she had once looked at Jack when the doctor had allowed Sayid to torture Sawyer.

The Iraqi blinked, turned away from her gaze, and re-focused on Sawyer, who now no longer looked at him with amusement. On his face was printed fierceness softened only by a strong undercurrent of satisfaction. Why did Sawyer appear so certain he would win?

Eko's great hand came down to start the fight, accompanied by the deep tones of his official voice. Sawyer was the first to move, the first to plunge forward. Sayid took only a few steps, to make sure he was not too close to the boundaries, and then he awaited the Southerner's first swing, which he ducked almost gracefully, stepping to one side, spiraling himself back to face his opponent, and brining his fist up all in one seamless motion. Perhaps there was something of the dance in the fight after all, he thought, but not for long. Sawyer's head fell back clumsily when Sayid struck his face. The strange noise of contact was always duller than Sayid expected, even after years of beating men for answers.

Sawyer was not as distraught by losing the first punch as Sayid had expected him to be. He only wiped at the small trickle of blood now slinking slowly from his nose, and he smiled. The smile unnerved Sayid, and he failed to block Sawyer's next blow, reeling back three steps from the force of the fist.

That was the last time the Iraqi permitted his concentration to be ruptured. As the fight continued, there was more dodging than hitting and several attempts to pull one another to the ground. Both men had lost all sense of the onlookers, but those who had never seen a real fight before, those who were anticipating a show, were no doubt disappointed.

At last Sayid managed to strike a blow hard enough to send Sawyer to the ground, and where the cowboy had fallen, Sayid struck him twice more. He pulled back and waited for the agreed upon words. But when Sawyer struggled to stand up, Sayid hit him again. Again the Iraqi waited for the words. And again Sawyer strained to stand.

Eko stepped forward, clearly wanting to end the fight, but he had consented to the rules before hand. There was no down count, only the words, and Sawyer had not spoken the words. The crowd had been cheering for one or the other (usually Sayid, despite the rumors and recent wariness, for Sawyer had days ago spent what little personal capital he possessed), but the people were now painfully silent.

After the cycle of beating and refusal had repeated itself three more times, Sawyer could no longer manage even to sit up. His lip was cracked; his nose was most likely broken, and he was breathing in heavy rasps. "Say it." Sayid did not yell the words in anger or in conquest—he practically whispered them, almost despondently. "Say it, Sawyer."

But Sawyer only smiled through his bleeding mouth and sputtered, "No way, no how, Mohammed."

Reluctantly Sayid hit him again, but he already knew it would be of no use. Sawyer would never say the words. Feeling like an animal caught in a trap, Sayid realized with a growing sense of dread that Sawyer was going to allow himself to be beaten to death.

Sayid knew the look of determination that brightened the fallen man's eyes: he had seen it occasionally in the faces of his victims in the dank interrogation rooms of the Republican Guard. He had seen that look, too, in Nadia's eyes. He had not hit her again after that single, initial strike, when the sight of her head reeling had set his stomach churning. But he had known from her eyes that even if he had continued to beat her, she would not have broken. He had pleaded with her to choose her own life over that of her friends, and she had refused. How could there be so much will in the world?

Sayid did not know how much more Sawyer could take. As an interrogator, the Iraqi had once misjudged the endurance of his victim; he had thought that just one more blow would elicit whatever meaningless confession the suspect was supposed to make. But it had only silenced him forever. Sayid swallowed hard when he recalled the scene, and he looked at Sawyer with gritted teeth.

This was the cowboy's last con. Sawyer had known all along that he was going to win this fight—one way or the other. He could humiliate Sayid through victory, by making him plead for mercy, or he could destroy Sayid by turning him again into a murderer, and when the Iraqi fell this time, the impact would finally shatter him, and he would be too defiled ever to rise again.

And maybe this latter course, thought Sayid, was the real victory Sawyer had coveted from the beginning: the chance to prove, though it cost him his own life, that Sayid really was the baser man. Sayid knew that Sawyer resented him, but the self-destructive depth of that resentment startled him now. He had not been anticipating this. Sawyer had told him the previous night, "You still _believe_ you're civilized." He hadn't feared Sayid's knife then. But now…now perhaps Sawyer thought that the heat of the fight and Sayid's desire to obtain the guns would overturn that pretense, and Sawyer could at last expose to the community what _he _believed to be the Iraqi's true nature.

Sayid thought he had been walking a path of reformation. He had stumbled when he had tortured Sawyer, and he had regretted the fall; he had imposed a wandering penance on himself. He had been purged by his encounter with Rousseau, and he had re-entered the society of the survivors determined to start anew. But what if he only _thought_ he had been purged? What if he had been living a kind of fleeting fantasy with Shannon, and what if Sawyer's assessment of his character was right after all? If Jack had not intervened, Sayid may perhaps have beaten Gale to death, not because he misjudged the man's endurance but because he was simply too out of control to care whether he killed him. And Sawyer must believe he was vile enough to do the same thing now, even to one of his fellow survivors.

Sayid looked down at the bloodied man, and then he looked up and caught the divided expression of judgment and compassion in Kate's features. Sawyer had already half-won, perhaps: Kate, at least, was looking upon Sayid as though he were a savage, but she had more sympathy for Sawyer than any other person on this island, and it was not too late to walk away.

Sayid stepped back. "This is over," he said.

Sawyer shook his head slightly, as much as he could managed, and muttered, "You don't get the guns until you make me say the words."

"You are beaten. Simply admit it." Sayid knew that he spoke in vain.

"No words, no guns. You have to make me say the words. We _agreed_."

"No guns then," answered Sayid, and he turned and pushed through the crowd, walking quickly away from the spectators, from the mangled mass that was Sawyer, and from the searing memory of a persistent past that refused to retreat more than a step behind him.


	7. Chapter 7

**Chapter Seven**

When Sayid left, Ana stepped forward and looked down at Sawyer and then up at the soaring figure of Eko. Her face was lined with confusion. Nothing official had been said; the Iraqi had simply walked away, and she was uneasy not knowing what had transpired.

Eko looked at her steadily, the way he had always looked at her whether he had been following her or defying her. She was certain that the priest made many feel uncomfortable, with his height and his breadth and his reserve, but she had never feared him; he was one of the few she had trusted implicitly in those early days, and his desertion of her had pricked her profoundly. It, more than the consequences of her own recklessness, had been the first thing to send her conscience reeling. That, however, had not been enough to supplant the desperation, and she had bound Sayid for fear of retaliation. Of _him_, she had been afraid. And perhaps she still was.

Ana was about to ask Eko if Sayid had won when Kate pushed her aside. The criminal ignored the cop and, also looking at Eko as though he were the bearer of answers, demanded, "Where's Jack?" She said it in that peculiar tone that always sounded to Ana like part assertive woman and part petulant child.

"He left before the fight began." As always, Eko was concise and formal in his speech, and his eyes betrayed no emotion. Only when he smiled, thought Ana, did he seem present and personal. But that wasn't quite true. He had held her when she had wept, and he had not smiled then. But he had certainly been present, and it was that personal touch that had kept her silently splintering spirit from rupturing altogether.

Kate shed her backpack on the ground beside Sawyer, whom she glanced at with both pity and repulsion, and she ran to find Jack. She returned with the doctor almost immediately. Jack, for all his sullenness, had been drawn back in the direction of the fight. He had left only to get his medical bag, and he had remained on the outskirts of the crowd, indignantly awaiting the fallout. He now knelt beside Sawyer and looked him over.

"Doc," Sawyer managed to whisper in doubtful greeting.

Jack raised his eyes to Kate. "Sayid did this?"

Kate nodded gravely. Sawyer, however, smiled. It was just like Jack to state the obvious. _The conclusion isn't exactly brain surgery_, he thought and regretted that he didn't have the strength to say it.

It was with much exasperated sighing and annoyed shaking of his head that Jack went about his work on Sawyer. At least the doc took his duty seriously, the Southern thought: if he didn't, there would be no chance of recovery, and since Sawyer had found a third path to victory—without either beating Sayid or dying himself—he wanted to live to taunt the Iraqi. Sayid had left with much of his honor intact: that was unfortunate. But he had not won the fight, and he had appalled some of his fellow survivors. To those triumphs, at least, Sawyer could cling.

Ana watched as Jack began his work. She did not feel the sympathy for Sawyer that Kate apparently felt, but there was a part of her—an intellectual, and not an emotional part—that regretted the indifference she had shown the wounded man when they had first met. She had been so bent on protecting her own that she had not much cared what stranger she discarded along the way. But they were all one tribe now. And yet, she still could not seem to muster an ounce of compassion for the beaten cowboy. She wondered if Sayid could manufacture any concern for him, or if Jack could for that matter…yes, she thought, Jack could—he did his duty, at least, didn't he? She, however, had not bothered to offer Sawyer a hand back then, and she had been peeved when others had done so.

She closed her lips into a tight line and looked away from the blood and the patching. Why didn't all that pain bother her, even a little bit? Why couldn't she make it bother her? She kept judging herself without feeling the judgment.

Ana now turned and walked rapidly in the direction Sayid had departed.


	8. Chapter 8

**Chapter Eight**

Sayid would have to find where Sawyer had hidden the guns. It was a resolution, and not a plan, that sent him to his tent to grab his backpack and begin his journey. The front was unzipped, but he did not notice the fact as he pulled the satchel up by its handle and jerked it from his tent, spilling the contents just outside on the ground.

As he knelt to gather his scattered things, he heard the soft approach of footsteps, muffled by the sand. He looked up to see Ana Lucia looking down at him. "So?" she asked. "Is he going to tell you where the guns are? I mean, you won, didn't you? But you just walked away."

"No. He is not going to tell me." Sayid began to pick up his clothes, maps, and a water bottle. He shoved them back into his sack.

Ana lowered herself to the sand to help him gather the rest of his things and to better gain his attention. "He reneged? I said you couldn't trust him."

"He did not renege," Sayid insisted. "We agreed the loser must ask his opponent to stop. Sawyer never asked me to stop."

"But you _did_ stop," Ana replied as she picked up something from the ground.

"I had to. He was not going to say it. He was going to let me kill him."

Ana seemed suddenly distant. She did not protest Sayid's words or decision. Instead, she gazed with curiosity at the tattered paper she held in her hands. "Who is she?" she asked. "Your sister?"

Sayid looked over at the ex-cop and saw that she was holding Nadia's charred photograph, the one he had recovered from the ashes of Rousseau's lodging and had buried deep in his backpack. He had not drawn it out in weeks. Angrily, he wrenched it from her hands.

Sayid glanced down at the picture's surface, at the determined cast of Nadia's countenance. He saw the haunting, ghost of a smile that almost threatened to curve her lips and the confident yet tender eyes that had once pierced his soul. And he saw blighting the smooth skin of her cheek a dull smudge: his own fingerprint in Sawyer's blood.

Yet it was not Sawyer's blood he now considered: it was the blood of years of composed torture, but it was also the blood of Henry Gale, the blood of passion. Frantic to remove the offending mark, he made a fist and began rubbing the edge of his hand against the bloodstain.

Apparently he had not realized that part of his hand was bloody too. Ana observed the look of dismay that distorted Sayid's features when he saw that he was only spreading the blood farther, darker, and more permanently across the woman's face.

He ceased his efforts with his hand and grabbed a white wash cloth he had already returned to his pack. He put the photo down against the satchel and began to rub hard with the cloth. The print seemed to dull and start to fade before the blood did. Some of the red-brown grime transferred to the cloth, but the rest ran deeper into the contours of Nadia's face. "It will not come off," he said said, rubbing still harder. "I cannot get the blood off. The blood will never come off now. I cannot clean--"

Ana grabbed him by the shoulder. "Stop, Sayid. Stop. You're only making it worse. Let me help."

When he let go of the cloth and threw himself into a sitting position on the sand, she began to work gently on the photograph. "Who is she?" Ana asked again.

Sayid did not want to answer—not to anyone, but especially not to her. Yet he found himself saying, "Someone I once hoped to deserve." He looked away from the ex-cop's work, towards the jungle. "Do not bother with the blood, Ana," he said quietly. "You and I…we both know it will not come off."

Ana ignored him and kept running the cloth against the photograph. "It can," she insisted. "Most of it can."

"Never all of it," he replied mechanically. "Never enough."

"No," she said, still working, "never all of it. But sometimes enough."

She stopped and handed him back the photograph. He looked at the face that was looking back at him. It now appeared muddy rather than bloody. There was a slight tear on both cheeks. Nadia's eyes were not so vibrant now, not alive like they once were, but he could still see them clearly, could still see them looking _through_ him.

Feeling unexpectedly queasy, Sayid crouched forward and returned the photograph—the last scattered item—to his backpack, and then he zipped it up roughly. He swung the backpack behind himself and looped his arms through the straps before rising from the ground. "Do you want to help me find the guns?" he asked Ana, but he did not look in her direction.

She didn't say the quest was pointless. She didn't say that neither of them could guess where Sawyer might have hidden the guns. She didn't point out how vast the jungle was. She only rose and followed him. She, too, needed something to do.


	9. Chapter 9

**Chapter Nine**

"Have you thought of just asking for the guns?"

They had already covered a mile in three directions from the spot where Charlie had said Sawyer first stored the guns. How far could Sawyer have taken such a weighty mass, by himself, under cover of night? Yet Sayid had noticed no tracks. Of course, any tracks would have been disturbed by this time. He now understood more clearly the English proverb about searching for a needle in a haystack. But then again, he hadn't really hoped to find the guns. He hadn't thought about the prospect at all. He had simply needed to act.

The pair was sitting and leaning against a fallen tree, drinking water and eating fruit to rejuvenate themselves. Sayid answered Ana, "Yes."

"And…?"

"And I asked. And he said no, even when I explained that we wanted them to pursue the Others and rescue the children."

"Of course he said no to _you_," Ana replied, taking a violent bite from her…what was it? She had never had this fruit at home. It filled the belly, anyway. She finished chewing and swallowing and continued, "As he would say to me. But what if we persuaded Kate to ask him?"

Sayid screwed the top back onto his bottle and replaced it in his pack. Had Ana observed Kate's concern for Sawyer? Of course she must have; she had been a law enforcement officer, and she must be inclined to notice people. But did Sawyer feel the same concern for Kate, or was she merely a target for his machinations?

"And which of us do you think should attempt to persuade her?" he asked. "I fear she has begun to despise me, and I do not think she has ever been particularly fond of you."

"But she's fond of Jack."

Sayid nodded slowly. The woman was brusque and belligerent, but her mind worked, and a perceptive mind never failed to impress him. "And Jack is fond of you." He glanced surreptitiously at her and saw one side of her lips arch. It was a wry smile, but not a bitter one, and there was something surprisingly feminine about it.

Now Ana nodded. "I'll see what I can do," she promised him. "I think we both know there's no point in searching anymore for the guns."

"I need you to do something else for me, which also involves Jack."

"Yeah? And what's that?"

Sayid looked at his hands, now cleansed from Sawyer's blood. "I need more time alone with Henry Gale."

Ana raised her eyebrows. "I'm not supposed to know about him. None of us are. But we all do."

Locke and Jack were laboring to keep their secret; Sayid had done nothing to expose it. Yet somehow the winds of rumour had cut through the silence. No one knew exactly who the man in the hatch was—only that his identity was uncertain, that he was possibly dangerous, and that Sayid had already done something questionable to him.

"And like I said before," continued Ana, "I've seen the way Jack and even Locke…and now some of the others…look at you. I know what it's like to be despised for doing what you gotta do, but …" She thought of the way he had scrubbed at that picture; she thought of what he had said without saying it, and of what she had replied. And she contemplated the blood of revenge that sullied her own hands. It was blood she felt impotent to wash away, yet it was also a stain she had learned to live with, if one could call what she did living. "…But are you sure you want to…to do that?"

His voice was low and defensive, his words measured: "What do you think I intend to do?"

"You tell me."

"I am merely going to ask him questions." He had extracted nothing from Gale with the beating, and if the man was indeed an Other—as Sayid sincerely believed he was—then he was not likely to crack under the threat of violence. Whatever these people were, they were ruthless in their pursuit of their mysterious objectives, and they would likely be ruthless to themselves. Gale would die before he let the truth be beaten out of him, but if only Sayid could coerce some small part of it before Gale observed what the interrogator was doing …

The Iraqi saw that Ana's face was doubtful. "I give my word," he said, as though that should be enough. And, as a matter of fact, it was.

Ana shrugged. "I'll try to get Jack out of the hatch. If I can get him to go to Kate to persuade Kate to go to Sawyer…but Locke isn't going to leave the hatch too. You'll still have to get past Locke."

"I will handle Locke."

Ana tossed the pit of her fruit carelessly behind herself. "Let's do this then," she said and rose. Something in her authoritative and aggressive tone struck Sayid as comical, and he had to force himself not to laugh as he, too, rose and prepared to return to camp. They would not "do this" until the morning anyway, he thought, for they had been in search of the guns all day, and the night was fast approaching.


	10. Chapter 10

**Chapter Ten**

_Note: I started "Raising and Army" before episode 2.15 aired, so my timeline may be a bit off. But, in this story anyway, the last 9 chapters occurred in a space of two days, between episode 2.14 and 2.15, and chapter ten now takes place more or less simultaneously with the events of 2.15. _

Sayid had not heard the commotion Claire raised when she discovered Aaron was sick. He had slept deeply and had arisen early in the morning. He now vainly hoped that a long run would turn his thoughts away from the blood that had stained Nadia's photograph and from the image of those perceptive eyes, which he had buried again at the bottom of his backpack.

He did not particularly care for the present dull exercise—the monotony of the sand beneath his feet, the burden of the sun against his back, the lack of an immediate goal, the aimlessness of it all—but he pressed on because he knew it was necessary that he be fit to run when needed.

Eventually, he stopped running and began his return journey in a languid stroll. He paused about half a mile outside of the camp, stripped to his boxers, and plunged into the surf to cool the sweat that had coated his body like an unpleasant film.

Sayid did not go far into the water. He knew he was not a skilled swimmer: he had never before needed to be. He supposed now was as good a time as any to seek improvement, but he would not strain himself. They had already lost one castaway to the ocean's wide grave, and death was too great a price to pay for pride…even now, even after circumstance and the will of the Others had stripped him of most of what had made life worth living.

Sayid had known grief and anger and that numbness that overtakes the soul when the dawn seems so distant as to be irrelevant. But the will to survive had not been dulled within him; it was not weak now, despite the fact that he himself did not expect to reach that horizon where the dim light of day might be slowly growing.

When they had crashed on the island, it was at first the thought of seeing Nadia that had fueled his desire to endure. But that seven-year hope he had finally surrendered when he freed himself from Danielle's dungeon. He had possessed good reasons to do so: his love for her had been an inspiration, but it had also been a shackle, and if he had continued to hazard his life upon it only to be disappointed…

It was well that he had moved on, that he had loved again. Or was it? His affection for Shannon had given him a direction and a meaning too; it had provided him with someone to protect, but that purpose had proved no more permanent than his quest for Nadia. Everything in life was finite, of course, and nothing was permanent but death. And since death was the one established variable, if he fought it, he would have a purpose as long as he lived.

These were not conscious musings that beset him as he swam. He did not generally eschew introspection, for he believed, as Sun Tzu had said, that if you know the enemy _and _know yourself, you need not fear the result of a hundred battles. At the moment, however, he was not inclined to acknowledge these thoughts, which ran instead like an invisible undercurrent in his mind. He drew himself by his arms back toward the beach, more clumsily than he would have liked, and then waded onto shore. He had no towel and intended to merely sit until the sun had dried him, but when he saw Ana approaching from the direction of the camp, he hastily pulled back on his sweat-dampened clothes over his cold, wet skin.

He felt himself stiffen into a professional pose. It was not that he had been precisely relaxed before that point, but he had been somewhat at sea, and not just literally. "Did you speak with Kate?" he asked as soon as she was within earshot.

She had been concentrating rather fiercely on her own footfalls and now looked up with a frown. She waited until she had drawn closer to him to respond. "Kate's gone with Claire."

Sayid's brow furrowed. "Gone where?"

Ana shrugged. "No one gets the full story around here. But it's something to do with Aaron, and they're looking for that French chick."

"Rousseau?"

"Yeah." Ana fidgeted with the stick she carried. She didn't know why she had begun to carry it again. She had access to a hunting knife now, and that would be more comfortable to tie against herself and likely more useful, but somehow she had begun to feel naked without the plain weapon that was fastened seamlessly to her side. Eko had done well enough with nothing more.

"Two women have gone out deep in the jungle, alone, and unarmed?"

At the words "two women" Ana pursed her lips and her eyes darkened slightly in defiance; Sayid noticed her hardening expression, but he was oblivious of its inspiration. "It is utterly foolish," he concluded.

"They aren't unarmed," Ana shot back, surprised to find herself instinctively defending Kate and Claire. She had thought the act was stupid, too, but she wasn't about to admit that to Sayid.

"And what did they bring?" he asked, eyeing her, she thought, condescendingly. "A stick?"

"A gun."

This had the effect she desired: Sayid was clearly taken aback. "How…"

"I was right," she said, and the self-satisfied tilt of her head irked Sayid, though he tried not to let it. "All Kate had to do was ask Sawyer. He gave her a handgun."

"One."

"Yeah, well, getting the rest of the guns from him is going to have to wait, I guess, until Kate gets back."

_If Kate gets back_, they both thought, though neither of them said it.


	11. Chapter 11

**Chapter 11**

Kate and Claire did fortunately return, and, although they refrained from announcing the details of their journey, rumor again ripped through the camp. Soon enough, Ana and Sayid learned that the women had discovered something momentous. The details, however, remained clouded. Since Jack had recently seen Claire in order to check on the baby, Ana took it upon herself to ask the doctor what he knew about the women's expedition.

While Ana addressed Jack, Sayid stood silently behind her. His arms were crossed easily over his chest, but his posture was less natural. He was too aware of Jack's cautious gaze. The doctor appeared to be uncomfortable with Sayid's presence, and he looked only at Ana when he spoke. "Not everyone needs to know everything," Jack told her in that voice that was an incongruous medley of hesitancy and authority.

The flirtatious smile with which Ana had greeted the doctor now faded into a defensive, firm line. "Maybe everybody does," she said. Ana-Lucia did understand the occasional value of secrecy, and she had not told the tailenders all the details of her own actions. A leader, she believed, must sometimes shoulder certain silent burdens for the sake of those she sought to protect. Now, however, she continued coldly, "Maybe it's time we all stopped keeping secrets from each other."

Realizing the negative effect her sternness was having on Jack, Ana attempted to soften her tone. "You know, maybe we oughta piece together the puzzle." And she meant what she said. Her desire to talk things out was inspired by more than her present awkward feelings of ignorance and powerlessness. Yes, she wanted to possess all the information and to gain some measure of control, but even more than that she wanted to accomplish a series of goals: rescue the children, ensure the castaways' survival, and…she barely dared to hope this far…find a way off the island.

Secrecy did not further those goals. It was true that revelation would probably result in an internal opposition among the survivors because it would force decision making. But weren't those tensions brewing anyway? And without adequate information, they could ultimately achieve nothing.

After the crash, Ana had done what she felt she had needed to do. She had not sought a consensus, and she had rarely solicited opinions. But things were different now. She wasn't the only one willing to lead now. And who was the leader here, really? Jack? Sayid? Locke? Kate? Sawyer? They were all vying for power, lords in their own separate spheres, all probably holding back some bit of information, some evidence that, combined, might create a decipherable case.

_What if the police force had acted like that?_ Ana wondered. No murderer would ever be apprehended. But here, it seemed everyone was a private investigator, a self-selected juror, or a secret executioner. She had tried to be all those things before: the first time was when she had shot the man responsible for her child's death. It hadn't worked. It hadn't brought her peace. She wasn't exactly penitent for her choice—the man had deserved it, after all—but she admitted now that the action had been futile.

Before she had lost her child, Ana had been able to cooperate with her fellow officers; she had known, also, how to be a loyal partner. But after that incident, when no one had truly understood her rage, she had isolated herself from those on the force and she had sought her own revenge. She had maintained this attitude of distance and autonomy after the crash.

Yet Ana's sovereignty hadn't washed away the past or improved the present—not at home and not here. It was time to acknowledge her need for others. That was why she had not tried to keep Sayid from following her when she went to speak with Jack. It was why she had already, whether she stated the truth openly or not, surrendered her unformed army to the ex-soldier.

The secrecy and the misguided paternalism weren't working. Nothing was being accomplished. They were all running in circles, backtracking in the jungle, making and unmaking their own hurried plans. Maybe there was a better way. "We all need more details," she insisted.

"People are better off not knowing everything, Ana. You know that. These people can't handle all this." Jack brushed his hand dismissively through the air as he spoke, and as attractive a man as he was, Ana felt deeply annoyed by his tone and his gesture. His cockiness was more subtle than her own, and his assertion of authority was much quieter, but the traits were there—and what she did not condemn in herself she had begun to dislike in him.

She stiffened her casual posture and could not prevent the derision from surfacing in her voice as she said, "Have to protect the ignorant masses, huh, Jack?"

"Ana, you know I don't mean—"

She interrupted him forcefully: "It's time to figure out what the hell is going on."

Jack shook his head in exaggerated disbelief. "And do what, Ana? And do _what_?"

"_You're _the one who came to me suggesting that we raise an army," she said. "Remember?"

"Well maybe I was wrong about that. If these people go off half-cocked in the jungle after God knows what is out there, we're all just going to bring more trouble on ourselves. We've been surviving," he insisted. "Let's go on surviving."

Sayid was surprised to find the doctor glancing over at him and even more surprised to hear him ask, "What do you think, Sayid?" There was something about the question that gratified him. The Iraqi had once sought to avoid any official role of leadership. Jack had long ago come to him for help—well, it seemed long here on the island, but it was in reality only weeks before. Sayid had half-dismissed the man then, telling him that if something needed to be done, he ought to do it himself. But in the end he had not waved aside duty, and he had led when he thought it fit; he had done so with more confidence than Jack but also with a less jealous guardianship of his role.

Now, however, Sayid felt within himself the need to guide, the overwhelming sense that if he was not a part of things, something would go terribly awry. Since Shannon's death, it seemed as if no one had turned to him for advice or kept him informed of passing events. They had avoided him like a fragile thing.

Sayid had taken the lead in extinguishing the fire, but he had done so, he thought, against expectations. They had not asked him to join in the hunt for Michael; they had not turned to him when they began to toy with the idea of an army; the women had not even asked him to lead them to Rousseau, whom he knew better than anyone. It was good to be asked his opinion again, even if Jack had only done so reflexively as he sought to defend his own position against Ana's.

"I believe Ana is correct," Sayid answered even though he knew his response would disappoint the doctor. "I think it is time to summon the survivors together and share with each other everything we know. Such an exchange of information will enable us to better understand our enemy."

Jack bobbed his head up and down, not in agreement, but in frustration. "Our enemy? Are we _really _at war now, Sayid?"

"You yourself have said it."

Jack gritted his teeth together. His hand went to his hips, and he looked away from Sayid when he spoke. "You want these people running off madly into the jungle after the Others?"

Sayid raised his eyes ever so slightly. "No. I believe that was your plan originally. I, however, want to train them to be prepared for any eventuality. I want to know what we are facing, and I want these survivors to be equipped to face it. We cannot possibly know what we are dealing with if we continue to keep secrets."

"Is that so?" Jack turned toward Sayid now and took several steps closer until the men were nearly face to face. The doctor's expression was as close to a snarl as he could muster, but he didn't really have the spirit to be intimidating. "Weren't you the one who wanted to keep Rousseau's transmission a secret? Weren't you the one who said these people"—he jabbed a finger towards the beach— "couldn't afford to lose hope?"

"That was before matters grew worse. That was before Walt was taken and before we knew about the other children. We need not involve everyone yet. But those of us who have intelligence should gather and organize it into an overall picture."

Jack raised his eyebrows and looked away. His head moved ever so slightly in that weary shake that was so common with him, and Sayid knew exactly what it meant—the doctor was going to consent, but he was going to do so resentfully. 

"Fine," Jack said. "Fine. I'll round up anyone who might know anything tonight. We'll hammer things out. We'll decide—together—what to do." When he said "together," he looked pointedly at Sayid as though to warn the Iraqi against any attempt at usurping power. "Who do you want involved?"

"Kate and Claire because of what they learned today. Sawyer and Jin because of what they saw on the raft. Sun to translate for Jin. Ana, Eko, and Libby to brief everyone on what they learned and experienced while on the other side of the island. Hurley because he was alone with Rousseau and because…I sense there is something he knows about the hatch. Charlie because he was with us when we first heard the transmission and because he was alone with Ethan. You and Locke of course."

The trio spoke for awhile longer. They discussed the resentment such a council might cause among the other survivors, and they decided to attempt to meet casually around an evening fire and to deny no one else who wanted to join them. Jack raised the issue of who would watch Gale in the meantime. Since the secret would be out soon enough, Sayid suggested that they let Bernard and Rose man the hatch and that the pair be warned of Gale's presence and told not to open the door.

When they parted ways, none of them felt particularly optimistic, but Sayid could at least sense the relief flowing slowly through his frame: something was, at last, being done.


	12. Chapter 12

**Chapter 12**

At dinner time, the summoned individuals gathered around the signal fire. Each was guarded and all glanced furtively at one another. It was Sawyer who spoke first. He had drawn himself to the meeting with some difficulty, and he was conscious of the pain in his battered face and body. But his bruises had not crippled his tongue. "Thirteen of us," he said. "I hope we're not modeling the last supper. Who's supposed to be our Jesus?"

His mockery was not wholly unwelcome. It seemed to cut through the tension that had blanketed the council, but his analogy had also accented a worrisome possibility: only dark nights seemed to stretch out ahead of them, nights that promised soul-wrestling, sweat, anguish, reluctance, betrayal, and blood.

"You, Sayid?" The Southerner drew out the question slowly while turning his severe eyes on the Iraqi. "The God-complex certainly fits."

Sayid did not answer. It was Locke who spoke instead, quietly, like a sage dispensing wisdom. His spirit, however, was anything but sage-like. It was tossing restlessly within as his gaze came to rest on Jack. "The better question is: who's our Judas?"

Jack did not ignore Locke's implication; he simply failed to observe it. He announced, "The reason I called this meeting tonight…"

Sayid and Ana both sat wordlessly as they allowed Jack to assume command. Ana humored him as a woman who, for all her austerity, understood the occasional benefits of stroking a man's ego. Sayid tolerated his authority as a soldier who comprehended the necessity of sometimes laboring under inferior superiors. It was not that he did not respect Jack for what he was and what he had done for the survivors; but he thought the doctor sometimes overextended himself and failed to understand the concept of comparative advantage. There were times when it was best to defer to others. The Iraqi would not seek to question Jack's judgment with regard to the treatment of a patient; why must Jack question his with regard to interrogation or the training of armies?

Sayid had to admit to himself, however, that Jack did better than he could have done to get the group talking in an organized manner. There was something of the natural leader in the man, for all his inconsistency, and Jack _was _broadly liked. That he was liked was his strength, Sayid thought, but that he _needed _to be liked was his weakness. Sometimes a leader must endure the spite of those whom he attempted to guide.

Sayid listened intently as Jack directed each person in the circle to relate whatever he or she knew of the Others, Dharma, the monster, the transmission, Rousseau, the hatch, and the island. For now, the Iraqi did not interrupt with questions. He could see each face dimly in the firelight, and he observed how the features of the survivors contorted with surprise, realization, concern, and speculation as each new bit of information was revealed. He was himself shocked to learn how little he had known.

When the last person had spoken, an oppressive silence surrounded the council. Even Sawyer looked too awed to speak; if he had any sarcasm to dispense, he could not at the moment bring himself to voice it.

Surprisingly, it was not one of the self-appointed group leaders who stirred the stillness. Claire spoke hesitantly, almost like a child asking her father if there were monsters in the closest: "So, what's happening to us? Are we a part of some kind of medical experiment?"

"It would appear so," rose Eko's booming voice. "The question is why."

"No," rejoined Sawyer, "the question is—how the hell do we stop it? I don't care why Dharma is doing what it's doing. I care that I not stay trapped in a maze like some lab rat."

"Yet knowing why may help us to stop it," suggested Sayid. "The more we know about Dharma's experiment—assuming there is an experiment being conducted—the more leverage we will have to resist and, eventually, escape." They had all seemed to switch smoothly from talk of rescue to talk of escape. It was a revealing transition, if a largely unobserved one. "And there is one person who likely knows more than we do: Henry Gale."

"We don't know Gale is with Dharma," hastened Jack.

"We have plenty of reason to suspect it," insisted Locke. He did so more to oppose Jack than because he agreed with Sayid. He himself had begun to wonder about Gale's complicity. And even if Gale was with Dharma, did that make him evil? If they were all guinea pigs, was the experiment necessarily malicious? Locke had the use of his legs now, didn't he? The island had given him that, at least. He hated to think this mystical place was but one grand laboratory, but if it was, the experiment was healing him.

Yet Locke couldn't let Jack usurp authority over him. He felt he must side with Sayid before he lost his grip on things, before Jack assumed responsibility for everything. If Locke allowed that to happen, the doctor might even insist they stop pressing the button. Sayid at least wouldn't do that, would he?

"He's certainly got a made-up name, anyway." Sawyer stretched out his legs in front of him and leaned back on his hands as he spoke. "The wizard ought'a be able to reveal something."

"The wizard?" asked Kate with a half-derisive, half-flirtatious smile. She was sitting rather close to Sawyer, and she now shifted position, allowing an arm to brush against his as she did so. He didn't react the way she wanted him to. He behaved as if she hadn't made the gesture.

"Yeah, the wizard," he said. "You know, in the _Wizard of Oz_."

Sayid, who had at first been inclined to dismiss anything Sawyer said as superfluous, now looked at him with interest. "What is the relevance of this wizard of oz?"

"It's a book," answered Sawyer, who had read quite a number of them. He had feigned to do so out of boredom, but boredom could not explain his voracious appetite for the written word. But whatever effect literature had on his mind or spirit, he would not reveal. If someone had asked him what he thought of _Moby Dick_, he would have said, "It's about a whale," and he would not have mentioned that he had read it three times, sometimes late into the night.

"Henry Gale is the name of the uncle of Dorothy in the _Wizard of Oz_," Sawyer explained pedantically. When the blankness in Sayid's face did not abate, the Southerner continued, "Okay, so it's a bit misplaced to call Henry Gale the wizard. He ain't the wizard. He ain't the guy behind the curtain who makes all the scary noises. But in the book, Dorothy and her dog Toto find themselves in the land of Oz and make some pals who go looking for this mysterious wizard. When they get to where the wizard's supposed to be, Toto knocks over a screen. And there's nothing but a little man there, a man who came to Oz from the Midwest in a hot air balloon. Sound familiar?"

Sayid's mouth fell slightly agape. He was surprised not only by the tale but by the fact that Sawyer's knowledge was proving so unexpectedly useful.

"Anyway," continued Sawyer, "when the guy first came to Oz, the people saw the letters O and Z on the balloon, and they assumed this Midwesterner was their king, and they built the Emerald City. Soon this balloon man decides to keep himself anonymous by calling himself the wizard and hiding behind a curtain and using special effects. It's the same story here. It's all theatrics and smokescreens."

"Like the theatrical paint we found," said Kate excitedly. "And the false beard." She looked at Sawyer with a bit of pride, as though his insightfulness was her own. "It's all theater. None of it's real. Not the monster, not the Others—none of it."

"And someone's behind it all," said Sawyer, ignoring her contribution. "Claire remembers Ethan and some lab coat talking about a certain 'he'. Well whoever _he _is, he's our wizard."

"And the thing Eko saw," said Libby, for the first time breaking into the conversation, "the thing Locke saw, the thing that tore down the trees, the thing that killed the pilot…all of them could be stage effects of some kind. Something mechanical—something controlled by remote. And all of this complex pretense seems to suggest that the experiment" —they all appeared to be accepting the theory of an experiment now, and no one had suggested a better explanation for the events that had befallen them—"is psychological rather than medical."

"Yet Rousseau spoke of a sickness," replied Sayid. "And Claire recalls having the baby inoculated against some sickness. This would suggest a physical, medical experiment. Perhaps Dharma's only intention for fabricating the monsters and the Others is to keep us from escaping the laboratory."

"And the button?" asked Locke, raising the issue for the first time and cinching the fear that had begun to knot in his stomach—the fear that the rest would now fail to take the button seriously. He would not have mentioned it, but he had to know what they were thinking; he had to brace himself to defend the computer if necessary.

Libby's response was just what Locke was hoping to avoid. "Psychological," she said as though the evidence were irrefutable. "They want to see if we'll keep pressing it."

"Maybe not," suggested Ana. "It could just be a way to keep us busy, keep us distracted from trying to escape the island. It doesn't mean they're testing us…just preoccupying us."

"Well," came Sawyer's loud drawl, "I'm with the shrink on this one, 'cause I gotta go by the book."

"What happens in the book to suggest a psychological experiment?" asked Sayid.

"Okay," answered Sawyer, "so Dorothy's friend the scarecrow thinks he's got no brains, and the lion thinks he's got no courage, and the Tin Man thinks he's got no heart…but the wizard knows they've had these things all along, even if they don't believe it. So he gives them some medicine he says will give them all these things, but it's nothing but a placebo. Just a placebo, and…abracadabra… …mind trick…the scarecrow's got his brain, the lion's got his courage, and the Tin Man's got his heart."

"Then what?" asked Sayid as he leaned forward anxiously.

Sawyer almost laughed to see him on the edge like that. The Iraqi looked like a boyscout hearing his first scary story around a campfire. With a wide grin spreading out beneath his broken and reset nose, Sawyer answered, "The wizard promises to take Dorothy home in a hot air balloon she sews from green silk. He leaves the Scarecrow to rule in his place. But Dorothy loses the dog. She goes chasing after the damn dog—"

At this, Sayid felt his throat constrict and he tried to brush away all thought of Shannon's pursuit of Vincent…

"—and she misses the balloon. It breaks off with just the wizard in it. Then Dorothy has all sorts of other grand adventures" —Sawyer spoke the word "grand" with sweeping sarcasm—"and she finally gets home by tapping together her silver shoes. She had the power to get home all along and didn't know it."

"Wish we had that power," said Hurley gloomily.

"Perhaps we do," suggested Eko. His voice was more subdued than usual, but it still carried itself regally in the air and fell on every ear.

"Gotta take the power," said Sawyer. He had heard Eko, of course, but he had dismissed the priest's primitive optimism. "Either way, they're screwing us—our minds, our bodies—whatever they're messing with, I don't want them messing with it. So, Torquemada,"—he turned abruptly to Sayid—"why don't you and Uncle Gale have a little chat tomorrow morning?"

"I have every intention of interrogating him," Sayid assured him.

"Then I'm observing," insisted Jack.

"Very well," Sayid replied grimly. He thought Jack's presence would be a deterrent, but it was better than having to fight him about the issue. At least now he would be able to talk to Gale without anyone dragging him from the room. And perhaps Jack would be put at ease when he saw that Sayid had no intention of resuming his former force. "But you say nothing. Nothing."

"Fine," agreed the doctor.

"If the object of the experiment is psychological," said Libby, not willing to leave the discussion so unresolved and desirous of fleshing out her own thoughts, "what might they be trying to accomplish? If Gale really did borrow the details of his story from the _Wizard of Oz, _if the bookreally is some kind of metaphor for what they're trying to do to us, then maybe they think they're making us into better people. And maybe that's why they took the children—because the children are young and impressionable: not quite blank slates, but not as fixed in their ways as adults."

Sawyer snorted. "Sounds more like _The Island of Dr. Moreau_. Playing God to turn beasts into men, and damn the pain it requires."

"_The Island of Dr. Moreau_?" asked Sayid.

Sawyer reveled in the way the Iraqi was looking to him—to _him_—for enlightenment. But he wouldn't satisfy the man's curiosity. Instead, he scoffed, "Damn, Mohammed, what _did _you read in your English classes, anyway?"

"Jane Austen."

Sawyer let out a great guffaw. "Jane Austen? Priceless. Oh, that's classic. Did you have to read her books aloud? Did they make you feel all warm and fuzzy?"

Now Sayid allowed the Southern's derision to creep like a parasite beneath his skin. He regretted that he could not seem to prevent Sawyer from riling him, but he pressed his teeth together tightly and fired back, "The books are satires."

"I read that book," chimed in Charlie, happily freeing Sayid from any further response. "Yeah, _The Island of Dr. Moreau_," continued the musician. "Yeah. It was creepy all right. And he was wrong, that guy. That Moreau. He thought he was doing good, but…bloody creepy."

Jack seemed to want to reign in the tangential direction of the conversation. "So our next step is for Sayid to talk to Gale, under my observation." Jack didn't notice Locke's eyes shift in disgust as he looked away at the surf undulating listlessly against the shore. The doctor concluded, "We'll all meet again tomorrow night? See what we can figure out then?"

There was a mumbled chorus of agreement, and people began to draw away to their separate shelters only to stay awake with their separate thoughts. As Sayid lay in his tent later that night, he thought of all the things they had not yet discussed. If there really was a master plan, a human order behind the chaos that had enveloped them, how and why had they become a part of it? If the island was an immense laboratory, how had Dharma ensured that the plane would crash here or that anyone in particular would survive? Yet Ana had insisted that the abductors had a list of names of specific people they wanted to capture. Had they compiled that list only after the crash, by living among the survivors as Ethan and Goodwin had done? Or had their agenda extended farther into the past? Had someone on that plane brought it down?

Sayid had not reacted to Locke's quiet comment about a Judas among them, but it was a consideration that now entered his mind. They had rooted out Goodwin. They had rooted out Ethan. The men were not on the manifest. But what if there were another traitor who _was _on the manifest, who had orchestrated the plane crash, who had managed to survive it, and who now labored beside them and feigned to help them?


	13. Chapter 13

**Chapter 13**

When the door to the vault swung open, Henry Gale met Sayid's eyes without flinching. But when he observed that the doctor was standing behind the interrogator, Gale seemed suddenly afraid of the Iraqi, and he backed himself against the wall, sliding down its length to sit on the floor. He drew his knees up protectively against his chest and stuttered, "What….what do you want with me now?"

Jack raised a hand in a conciliatory gesture. "Don't worry," he said. "Don't worry. I'm not going to let him hurt you. I'll be here the entire time."

Sayid suppressed his annoyance and stepped into the vault. Jack followed him, and then Locke, too, tried to enter, but the doctor spread both hands out to prevent him. "Too many cooks, John," he said.

Locke looked at Sayid with eyes that seemed to expect the Iraqi to admit him, but Sayid only nodded. It was bad enough that Jack insisted on accompanying him; he certainly did not want a third man hindering his interrogation. He saw how Locke's mouth tightened as he turned away and closed the door behind him.

Sayid stood in a corner, leveled his gaze at Gale, and tried to ignore Jack's presence. "When were you born?"

"Why should that matter?" asked Jack from beside him.

Sayid shot a withering glance at him, and the doctor rolled his eyes and nodded his head as though to say he would humor Sayid and remain silent. Jack walked to another corner and rested against the wall, but he continued to watch the exchange like a high school coach who was waiting for his star player to slip up.

The litany of questions continued: "When were you married?"; "How long did you know your wife?"; "When did you begin flying hot air balloons?"; "What was the last book you read?"; "What was the last movie you saw?" Sayid was attempting to establish a base line and trying to learn Gale's expressions. That way, the interrogator would be able to evaluate the truth of Gale's responses to more serious questions.

Yet Henry Gale never seemed to be recalling information. He did not look up before answering; he did not look to the side; he did not look down. He simply stared straight ahead at Sayid as he answered, as if everything he said were rehearsed. And that, Sayid thought, would make sense if he were borrowing his entire life story from fiction. Every word the man spoke was a lie.

"What is my name?" Sayid asked at last.

Here Gale's eyes did shift upward, so briefly and so slightly that, had Sayid been blinking, he would have missed the movement. Gale answered, "Sayid Jarrah. I remember because it was such an…interesting introduction." And then he glanced at Jack and back at Sayid. In a tremulous voice—Sayid thought a falsely tremulous voice—he continued, "Why are you asking me these things? You have never told me just who you think I am."

Sayid took four steps closer. "Stand up," he commanded in a suddenly harsh voice. He felt Jack draw up behind him. Even without seeing the doctor he could envision the warning look on his face. Sayid stiffened. He did not turn, but Jack must have interpreted his tension as an order, because Sayid felt the doctor step back.

Gale drew himself up slowly from the floor. Sayid thought the man was pretending to experience more pain than he actually felt.

"You are lying," Sayid said. His voice was calm though cold. There was no rage in it this time, no quivering. He did not repeat the statement.

"I…I don't know why you think—"

"You say you came here in a hot air balloon," stated Sayid. "The balloon had a yellow envelope and a happy face at the top of the envelope."

"Yes," answered Gale cautiously.

"Balloons built for long trips such as the one you were undertaking are usually coated with a silver material made from Mylar. It is necessary to repel the sun and heat."

"Yes," said Gale, not dropping Sayid's gaze. "It's unusual, I admit. Everyone thought I was eccentric for going on the journey, but the material is still protective."

"You said your balloon was equipped with a transponder. Why was it not equipped with more? Radio? Video? Tracking equipment? A weather station?"

"I…we were feeling adventurous. My wife and I…my wife…we were trying…" Gale stuttered as though he was too sad to speak the words, but Sayid did not believe there was any true grief in the man's heart. "We were trying to recapture the romantic adventures of the past, you know, the kind you read about. We didn't want too much modern technology."

Sayid stepped away from Gale and back into the corner. "I do not believe there is a balloon," he said. "I believe you have manufactured your entire story. Have you read the _Wizard of Oz_?"

Gale laughed nervously. "Yeah. Yeah. I know. I've got the same name as Dorothy's uncle. Believe me, I've been ribbed plenty for that."

"And the balloon, and the Midwest…just a coincidence?"

"I'm from Minnesota, not Omaha. The wizard was from Omaha."

"If there is truly a balloon," Sayid said casually, looking down at the floor and leaning back against the wall, "then tell me where it is. Relate to me all of the landmarks that surround it. Draw me a map." Now he looked up abruptly at Gale. "Draw me a map to your wife's grave."

He expected Gale to be intimidated by this request. He was certain the man was lying and that the fear of discovery must now make him flinch at least a little. But Gale only nodded. "Okay," he said quietly. "Okay. I'll draw you a map with landmarks, but I don't know where I am now. I can't draw you a map from here."

"You do not need to," said Sayid. "We will find it based on your landmarks. We have explored some of this island. We will find the balloon and the grave, if they are there. _If _you are telling the truth."

"I'll need pencil and paper," replied Gale.

Sayid nodded coolly. "Jack."

"Uh-uh, Sayid. You go get it. I'll stay here."

Sayid's eyes were weary as he rolled them in Jack's direction, and he fought down a sigh. But he left the vault.

When Sayid exited the vault and reached for a notepad and pen, he heard Ana's voice rising from near the computer: "Does Jack know you're coming to me with this?"

And then he heard the last part of Locke's low response: "…man in my hatch, and I want him out."

"_Your _hatch, John?" Sayid asked, walking over to the pair.

Locke appeared startled by his presence, but then his usual calm demeanor returned. He opened his mouth to speak, but Ana interrupted him. "You been talkin' to Gale?"

"Yes," Sayid answered, his eyes still trained on Locke. But Locke only looked to the side and walked away somewhere deeper into the hatch, leaving Sayid alone with Ana.

"Did he say anything?" Ana asked.

"Enough for me to ascertain that he is lying."

Ana nodded to the notepad and pen he was holding. "Didn't know you Iraqi-style interrogators took notes."

"He is going to draw me a map to the balloon, and I will follow it to prove, once and for all, that he is lying."

Ana kept looking at the paper and pen in Sayid's hands. Finally she grabbed it and strutted towards the vault. He pursued her quickly.

While Sayid was gone, Henry Gale had looked gratefully at the doctor and had said, "Thank you. Thank you for ensuring that he didn't start beating me again. I have no idea who you people think I am…but that man…that man made no sense; nothing he said made any sense, and he just kept beating me and beating me and saying the same thing over and over…"

Jack sniffed and nodded as he stepped closer. "I know. I'm sorry about that. It was out of my control. But nobody—nobody is going to do that to you again as long as I'm here, you understand? Nobody."

Gale shrugged weakly. "As long as you're here," he said quietly. "But those other two—that fellow Locke and that Arab—they could ignore your desires. They don't seem to like you much. They could come in when you're not around—"

"That's not going to happen, okay?" insisted Jack. "I'm not going to let it happen."

"You let it happen once," said Gale. "I don't know why you let them make the decisions like that. You're the one who has the skill to heal people. I don't understand why you let them order you around."

Jack's breath was heavy as he replied, "No one orders me around. We had a disagreement, and they…they circumvented me, but I don't take orders from—"

The door swung open and Jack abruptly stopped talking. He pursed his lips together and was surprised to see Ana at the door. He looked behind her to Sayid. The Iraqi followed Jack's eyes to Gale's, and suspicion twined itself like a serpent about his thoughts. Something had transpired, he was certain, but what?

Ana handed the notepad and pen to Gale. "Draw me a map," she insisted, "and I'll find your balloon."

When she had obtained her map, Ana left the room, and Sayid again followed her. He had to grab her wrist to turn her to face him. "Give me the map," he commanded when she was face to face with him.

"Uh-uh," she replied. "I'm finding this balloon."

"You believe there is a balloon?" he said, the anger rising in his voice. "You believe he is telling the truth? You believe him instead of me?"

"Look, Sayid," she said, wrenching free from his grip. "I don't doubt your abilities, but I didn't doubt mine either when I threw Nathan in that pit. And I turned out to be wrong. I was planning to torture him. I was planning to do whatever I needed to do to get him to talk. And he wasn't even with them."

"Perhaps he was," suggested Sayid.

Ana was stunned by his response. She couldn't break her gaze from the Iraqi's eyes. "What do you mean?" she asked.

Sayid shrugged slightly. "Why do you think Goodwin killed him?"

"Goodwin told me he killed him because if I started torturing him, I'd find out he wasn't the spy, and then I'd start looking for someone else."

Sayid raised his eyes in a gesture of doubt. "Well that in itself is an unlikely explanation. Why would Goodwin kill Nathan to avoid discovery? The very fact that Nathan _had_ been killed would send you looking for another spy. If Goodwin was truly trying to avoid discovery, then killing Nathan was a poor means to do so."

"Then why would he kill him?" Ana asked. It was the first time she had considered that her actions had not been a failure.

"To prevent him from revealing something to you."

Ana looked down at the map she held in her hands. "Do you really think so?"

"I only think it is _possible_," he replied. He reached out cautiously and placed his hand around the notebook, and then he pulled.

She held it firmly. "And it's _possible_," she said, "that Gale isn't lying. It's possible he's just another innocent victim of this island. It's possible we've kept him locked up for days for nothing." She looked down at Sayid's hand on the notebook. She yanked the map out of his grasp. She held it up, shook it in his face, and said, "_This_…this is my chance to know for sure about this guy. I'm not letting you make the same mistake I was about to make. I _have _to do this. Can't you understand that?"

"Then I am coming with you."

Her expression was insolent but she consented. "Fine."

"Where are you going now?" he called after her as she began to make her way out of the hatch.

"To see a man about a gun. I'm not going far into that jungle unarmed."


	14. Chapter 14

**Chapter 14**

Ana awoke to find Sayid staring at her. Had he remained awake all night? And at what point had she drifted off to sleep? She viewed his countenance with some trepidation: what did that nearly vacant expression mean? Last night she had apologized to him, and he had not rejected her apology, but he had not quite accepted it either.

Sayid, she thought, had every reason in the world to hate her, but he had actually treated her with less callousness and obvious dislike than many of the other survivors had. His magnanimity bewildered her. Perhaps he was only more restrained than the rest; perhaps his vehemence coursed like a suppressed current beneath his thoughts, kept tightly bottled by mantras and displaced anger, anger which took the form of hatred for Gale and which expressed itself in the certainty that they would discover no balloon.

And now he sat gazing at her where she had lain vulnerably for who knew how long while he thought of—what? He could have snapped her neck in the night if he had wanted to. He could have done anything.

"What?" she asked. Charlie was nowhere to be seen, not that the wispy musician would have been much of a deterrent if Sayid had wanted to slay her in her sleep.

"Nothing," the Iraqi answered indifferently.

She drew herself from the ground and watched the Englishman return bearing fruit. She had failed to obtain a gun from Sawyer, who had pointed to his battered face and mocked that her companion ought to be weapon enough. But Charlie had somehow managed to get a gun, and she had perceived its bulge yesterday, although he had of course delivered it to Sayid instead of her.

Why would Charlie have a gun, she wondered, and why had Sayid insisted that he accompany them on this little journey? The musician irritated her, and his choice of the word murder yesterday afternoon had not further ingratiated him with her. She had been relieved and surprised when Sayid had turned back to tell him his words were enough, but the rebuke he gave Charlie also had the effect of further stirring her already churning guilt.

She watched Sayid refuse Charlie's offer of breakfast, and she rose to follow him, leaving the musician in her wake. She did not understand what had given birth to the odd couple, but lately the Englishman had begun to trail after the Iraqi like a ubiquitous little dog, and Sayid evidenced no desire to kick him to the curb. Charlie muttered something Ana did not bother to hear, and then he followed.

When they reached the map's destination, Sayid seemed to smile with arrogant satisfaction, but Ana would not accept his assurance even though it was to her benefit. If all his anger remained directed at Gale, none of it would be deflected back to her. But she nonetheless insisted on looking farther. She would not make the same mistake twice, even if it cost her Sayid's mercy.

She saw him sneer at her insistence, like a man irked by opposition, but he did not deny her. The three fanned out across the field, exploring the grid Sayid had divided for them. Ana lost sight of her companions after an hour, but she heard Charlie's voice rising in the distance with a shout, and she ran in his direction.

Sayid likewise had come sprinting towards the call, and when they reached Charlie he was beyond the open field, a few feet into a spot of jungle, pointing up with wonder at the canopy of the trees. Ana's eyes followed his, and then they turned immediately to Sayid.

The ex-soldier was looking up at the remnants of the balloon that blocked the sun above them. The yellow smiley face seemed to gaze back at him with winking mockery. Ana saw his lip quiver and watched him cinch his jaw tightly closed. His eyes became cold and distant, and his hands formed fists at his side. He looked down from the balloon to the floor of the jungle, and then he took two steps backward, turned, and began to walk away alone.

Ana looked again at the balloon, then at the nervous face of Charlie, and finally back to the retreating Iraqi. His movements were slow but determined, and she could almost see the tension that seemed to course beneath the sinews of his arms; even from this distance, she could sense the thinly veiled rage that emanated from his frame.

And what had she hoped for herself? Not to prove Sayid wrong, certainly. Yet she did feel a sense of relief at discovering the truth, of knowing that she had not again wronged a man before determining who and what he was. But there also rose within her chest a choking fear…Sayid had not wanted this result. He had beaten Gale badly. He had been certain of his own righteousness. He had channeled all his anger at a single object, and now the target of his wrath had been cruelly withdrawn from his vision. And now he was turning on his heels, turning and walking rapidly back in their direction.

When he reached them, he drew close to Ana, his face but inches from hers. "Is this what you wanted?" he spat. "Is this what you hoped to find?"

She swallowed and shook her head. "No. I just wanted the truth. Didn't you?"

He jabbed his finger in the direction of the balloon. "This is a trick," he insisted. "It is only a trick."

"Sayid," interrupted Charlie's hesitant voice, "the balloon is here just like he said it would be—"

Sayid turned abruptly to face the musician. "That does not mean he is not lying. He knew this balloon was here, and he incorporated its existence into his story, but he did not come here in it, and he _is_ one of them."

From behind him Ana spoke with forced confidence. "Sayid, you're taking this too far, you've gotta--"

Her words were cut short by the sound of multiple rifles cocking. She heard it. Sayid heard it. Only Charlie looked bewildered by the sudden silence that befell Ana and by the look of ready caution that overtook Sayid's eyes and stilled his figure. The ex-cop and the ex-soldier were looking at one another, but what they were communicating, Charlie could not guess.

s


	15. Chapter 15

**Chapter 15**

Charlie looked from Ana to Sayid repeatedly, and he was about to ask just what the bloody hell was going on when a masculine voice came from somewhere behind the trees. It uttered something in a foreign language, and Charlie's eyes widened in shock. He twisted his bottom lip and bit into it, and then he nervously shoved his hands in his pockets. "Hey!" he called. "We don't speak Ger--"

Ana silenced him with a finger to her lips and a sharp glare, while Sayid removed the handgun from where it had been lodged against the small of his back. He racked the slide, and the noise resounded in the suddenly silent jungle.

"Lay down your firearm," came another male voice, this time speaking in heavily accented English. "We are all armed."

Charlie glanced furtively at Sayid, but the Iraqi made no move to disarm himself. "Sayid," Charlie hissed with a jerk of his head.

Sayid looked not to Charlie but to Ana. Her eyes were searching the jungle beyond the protective canopy of the balloon, but she wasn't seeing anything through the rain. Ana looked at the Iraqi and nodded slowly, and Sayid lowered his handgun to the floor of the jungle, stood straight again, and held out his empty hands while moving in a circle and surveying the expressionless trees.

There came from the distance an exchange of dialogue which none of them could decipher, but Sayid could distinguish three separate voices, two male and one female. There was a movement of leaves, and then the voice that had spoken English spoke again. "Are you with them?"

"With whom?" replied Sayid.

"_Them_."

"We're survivors of Oceanic Flight 815," cried Charlie loudly and excitedly. "We're not with the Others."

The hidden figures again engaged in a scramble of dialogue, their voices rising and falling as though they were arguing fiercely with one another, and then there was silence followed by the rustling of earthly debris.

The three waited in silence, but they heard nothing further. Finally, Sayid squatted slowly and cautiously to the ground and reclaimed the handgun. He motioned to Ana to stay with Charlie, and then he ran off in the direction of the voices.

He returned fifteen minutes later shaking his head. "No tracks at all," he said.

"They were speaking German," Charlie said with assurance and a note of self-satisfaction. His tongue flitted out between his lips as he nodded. "Yeah, I'm pretty sure of it. German."

"Well they're gone now," said Ana, turning back to look at the balloon and then taking a few steps further beneath its center to where a grave stood. "And I don't think they were with the Others or Dharma or whatever you want to call them. Not if they didn't take us."

Charlie sneered. "Maybe we weren't on the _list_." 

Ana was now kneeling at the grave and pressing her fingers against the earth. "This was dug within the last month," she said. "Gale was telling the truth."

Sayid squatted down on the other side of the grave. He toyed with one of the rocks that marked the mound. He looked over at Ana with pronounced annoyance. "Do not presume his wife's body rests in this grave."

Ana rolled her eyes with exasperation and looked to the ground. She kept her gaze there for awhile before turning back to Sayid and saying in a thinly controlled voice, "So what? He planned his entire story from the beginning? He planted this grave and this balloon just in case he _happened _to get captured by us, and then, even though he had this all lain out here, he strung you on for two days before drawing a map?"

Sayid looked callously back at the ex-cop. "Perhaps you are familiar with the term alibi."

Ana snorted and stood up. She looked at Charlie, who simply shrugged. And then she saw the musician's face flinch with surprise, and she followed his gaze back to Sayid. The Iraqi was raking the dirt from the grave with his hands.

"Christ, Sayid!" Ana exclaimed. "Are you insane?"

"Jeez..." agreed Charlie, turning his face away from the spectacle in disgust. "Didn't you say he claimed he buried her a couple of weeks ago? That thing is going to raise one hell of a stink."

"Get me a stick," Sayid ordered Charlie, "that I may use as a shovel. Obtain one for yourself as well."

Charlie crinkled his nose in repulsion, but he wandered off to follow Sayid's command, and he returned with the requested implements. Ana refused to participate, but once the body was exposed, she saw a self-righteous, half-smile creep across Sayid's features as he nodded with satisfaction. Curious, she inched toward the edge of the grave and looked down at the body within. "I'll be damned," she murmured.

Charlie's light eyebrows knitted together in confusion. "His wife was a man?" he asked.

Sayid fell back into a sitting position and draped his arms on his knees. "As I expected," he said to Ana.

"You expected a big black man?" Charlie asked, his voice rising higher with each word.

"I did not expect to find a body at all," replied Sayid. "Which is to say, I expected Gale's story to be disproved. And…" He motioned toward the body below. "…Clearly it has been."

Ana, who had previously been repulsed by Sayid's insistence on digging up the grave, now evidenced no qualms about falling to her knees and rummaging through the victim's clothes. She pulled out a driver's license.

"What is it?" Charlie asked, seeing her laugh lightly and bitterly.

But Ana did not answer Charlie. Instead, she reached across the grave and handed the license to Sayid. She knew he was going to smirk when he saw the name, and so she looked aside at Charlie instead and told the Englishman, "This…_this _man is Henry Gale."

Charlie walked over behind Sayid and examined the license over his shoulder. "How incredibly stupid," he said with disbelief. "Why…why would he take the name of this guy? Why would he send us to his grave knowing he was buried with his driver's license?"

Ana shrugged nonchalantly. "Criminals are usually stupid," she said. "They don't operate the way you see on television. They don't plot well, they don't hide well, and they don't kill mostly rich white people. Seventy percent of the time, you pick 'em up at their girlfriend's house."

"But this man," insisted Sayid, "this man plotted well. It is a valid question, Charlie."

Charlie hmphfed in Ana's direction and gave a cocky shake of his head. "Yeah," he said. "A brilliant question." And then, looking back to Sayid with bewilderment, he asked, "But what's the answer?"

"Perhaps he wanted us to find this license," Sayid suggested. "Perhaps he wanted us to disbelieve his story. Perhaps he allowed Rousseau to capture him."

"Why?" asked Charlie.

For this Sayid had no answer, but Ana responded, "They're screwing with our minds, just like Libby said."

"Regardless of the reason for his actions," said Sayid, "the fact remains that he is one of them. And we must deal with him accordingly."

To this neither Charlie nor Ana made reply, but the trio soon agreed to head back to the beach camp. Charlie wanted to reach home by nightfall. _God, **home**, _the musician thought as he trailed after Ana and Sayid. _I didn't just think that word, did I?_


	16. Chapter 16

**Chapter 16**

A full hour bereft of any conversation was about as much as Charlie could tolerate. "So," his voice rose loudly as he walked behind Sayid and Ana, "are we going to talk about the Germans, or what?"

Sayid glanced back at him with…_What else? _Charlie thought. _Annoyance._ Sayid looked annoyed seventy percent of the time. His expression had a way of belittling a man, and that irked Charlie more than just a little bit. It would have downright maddened him if not for the fact that he felt an inexplicable need to impress the Iraqi.

Ana turned back towards him with a very similar expression printed on her brow. _Might as bloody well be siblings_, Charlie thought. "What?" the musician exclaimed defensively. "What? Don't you think we ought to at least talk about it? I mean, we were surrounded by gun wielding Nazis on intercontinental mystery island, after all."

Ana ran a tongue around her lips and shrugged. "Maybe they were with the Others. Maybe they left us alone just like they left Jack and Sawyer and Locke alone that day. Like you said, maybe we weren't on the list. They don't want all of us."

"Just the good ones," mumbled Charlie. "Whatever the hell that means."

Sayid nearly tripped over some fallen debris, but he steadied himself and stumbled on.

"We need to take a break," Ana insisted.

Sayid disagreed. "We will not return before nightfall if we stop now."

"So, we'll light torches." Ana glanced at the Iraqi and her eyes searched him up and down. "You're dead on your feet, Sayid. You haven't slept in at least 24 hours. We stop. We eat. Maybe you nap a little."

"I am not going to…_nap_."

"Then _sit_," she demanded.

Sayid acted as though he did not hear her and continued walking. His footfalls were surprisingly silent against the jungle floor, which was littered with all manner of fallen leaves and sticks. Ana shed her backpack and dropped it with an audible thump. "Fine," she called after him. "We're stopping. You keep going until you collapse. We'll pick you up when we pass by."

Sayid stopped walking, but he did not yet turn. Charlie stood somewhere between the two, looking from one to the other, not ready to make a choice. In the end, he knew he would follow Sayid, but after the skipped breakfast, Charlie was considerably hungry. And Sayid _did _look exhausted. Not that he was going to admit that to Ana.

Sayid turned slowly and began retracing his steps. "If _you_ require a rest, Ana" he said, "simply admit the fact, and I will be glad to pause until you are prepared to journey on." He let his backpack slide from off his shoulders not far from hers, and he sat down. Ana exhaled a heavy, disgusted breath, but she refrained from saying anything. She just sat down too, followed by a relieved Charlie. The three ate some fruit before leaning their heads back on their packs.

An hour later, Ana nudged a slumbering Sayid with the toe of her shoe. He looked momentarily startled as he clawed his way to consciousness, but he rose without comment or admission, quickly took up his pack, and began walking. The other two followed.

While they walked, Ana kept shooting glances at Charlie, who was fingering something in his pocket. Charlie sensed her scrutiny and quipped, "Admiring me again, are you?"

"What's in the pocket?" she asked.

"Nothing," he said.

Sayid glanced back with curiosity at the bickering couple, and then he glanced down at Charlie's pocket. It was clear he believed Ana's assessment. _Some loyalty_, Charlie thought. _She's not the one worth trusting._

By now Sayid had stopped walking. "What is it, Charlie?" he asked.

Reluctantly, Charlie pulled out a roll of twenties from his pocket and handed it to Sayid. Sayid took the money with a look of bewilderment.

"What? You robbed a dead man!" Ana exclaimed. "Of money you can't even use? Who are you, Sawyer?"

"Hey," insisted Charlie. "Sayid took his wallet. I just took the cash, which was in his other pocket. You know, just in case we ever…" He wouldn't allow himself to complete the hope.

Ana rolled her eyes and turned away, only to find Sayid rifling through the money and examining it. "Does anyone have a pen?" he asked.

"A pen?" Ana placed a hand firmly on one hip. "Yeah, right in my back pocket. I keep it to journal, you know. I've got to keep track of all of my wonderful adventures and share my latest crush with my diary."

Sayid shot her an incendiary glance as Charlie stepped forward and proffered him a pen with a quiet, "Yeah, I got one."

Sayid motioned for the musician to turn around so he could use Charlie's back as a living clipboard. He began writing on one of the twenty dollar bills.

"What are you doing?" Ana asked, trying to mask her curiosity with something that sounded more like condescension.

"I will need to interrogate Gale when we return, of course," he said. "I am creating a tool."

"A tool?" Ana asked. "Wanna fill me in? It might help if we work together."

"I work alone," answered Sayid, recapping the pen and handing it to Charlie. He folded the twenty and placed it in his pocket.

As they resumed their journey home, Ana fell in step behind him. "And how's that working for you?" she asked. "You know, that working alone thing? You get anything significant from him?"

Sayid did not respond.

"Look, I know we're not going to be best buds, Sayid, but we _can_ work together. We've both been interrogators. You beat this guy so badly…he's never going to open up to you. He's always going to clam up. He's already fixed his opinion of you. But we can use that. We can make him fear you, and when he fears you enough…he can turn to me."

"Good cop, bad cop?" Sayid asked.

"Exactly," answered Ana with a smile. She didn't smile much in Sayid's presence. He was almost placated by the expression.

"Very well. We will attempt it. But if it is not successful, I am taking over the interrogation—my methods and my methods alone."

Ana nodded her head in agreement, and the two discussed their plans as Charlie trailed eagerly behind them, trying to match their pace and catch all of their conversation.


	17. Chapter 17

**Chapter 17**

"I've got it under control."

To Locke, Jack's voice was gratingly dismissive. That was all the information the doctor was going to give, and Locke could do nothing but lie impotently on the bunk, lift himself half off it, and glance out the door into a hallway that revealed nothing.

Jack had it under control? Then why the gunshot? Locke had promised to protect Henry—or whoever he was—and what if Sayid had shot him? Henry had come back for him. Unlike his father, and unlike Helen, Henry had come back for him. The man had lied about his name, admittedly—Sayid had discovered that much and Locke did not doubt him—but the prisoner hadn't betrayed Locke. He hadn't abandoned him. He hadn't walked off with a suitcase full of money, or driven off with a "no" on his lips. He had come back.

Henry _needed_ Locke. The survivors had once needed him, too: they had needed him to hunt, needed him to feed their starving bellies, needed him to open the hatch. But even then they hadn't been precisely grateful, had they? They had looked on him as some kind of slightly off-kilter soul simply because he had possessed the weaponry and the skill to hunt, kill, and provide.

And now Jack was dismissing him altogether. "I've got it under control." _I don't need you, John. No one needs you. You're a tool. We're more than happy to use you from time to time—but we don't need you. _

And now he could hear Sayid's footsteps leaving the vault, at first pounding with anger against the floor, and then gradually slacking off to his more natural and quiet pace. "Sayid!" Locke called out.

His summons was followed by what seemed to Locke an interminable silence before the Iraqi finally came into the doorway and leaned against the frame. "Yes, John?"

"What happened back there?"

"Nothing that should concern you." Sayid straightened himself as though preparing to leave.

"But I am concerned. I'm a part of this, Sayid. I need to know what happened."

"Then why not begin by telling me what happened yesterday? Why did you free that man?"

"I told you…the hatch went into lockdown, and I needed him to press the button."

Sayid leaned again against the doorway. He had that casual look in his eyes that Locke by now knew would precede an intense line of questioning. "You told him the numbers?"

"Yes," Locke answered.

"And what did he do?"

"He crawled through the vents to get to the computer. Then he…" Locke paused. If he told Sayid what Henry had said…if anyone knew…the survivors might not see the importance of continuing to press the button. Though Locke felt a partial loyalty to Gale, he could not believe—he must not believe—that nothing had happened when the button was not pressed. Gale had lied before; he must have lied about this. "He entered the numbers."

Locke saw Sayid's head tilt; he saw the Iraqi trying to catch his eye. He knew Sayid did not believe him. 

"Why do you hesitate, John?"

"Look, I promised I wouldn't let anyone seriously hurt him. He helped save my leg from being completely crushed. He didn't run away like he could have. Can't you at least give him credit for that?"

"He had his reasons, I am certain."

Locke now leveled a calm gaze at the Iraqi. He spoke quietly. "Did you try to shoot him, Sayid? Just now? Did you try to shoot him?"

Sayid crossed his arms across his chest. "He thinks I did."

Locke nodded solemnly at this response, as though those four short words were all it took to explain the entire scenario. He felt a sense of relief to know that the would-be Henry Gale would not be harmed; at least, not as long as he could still potentially provide some useful information. "Is Ana in there with him now?" Locke asked.

Sayid shook his head. "I don't think so. She'll question him later." Abruptly shifting the subject, Sayid continued, "You told him the numbers, and he memorized them?"

"Yes. And then he crawled through the vents."

"How many times did you repeat the numbers?"

"How many times?" Locke asked, and he could feel his own stomach dropping slightly. He had told the man once. Once. And Gale hadn't asked for a repetition. He hadn't asked because he had had no intention of entering the numbers. He hadn't asked because the button was a joke. _No,_ Locke thought. _No. I haven't wasted days pressing that thing. I have a purpose on this island. The button has a purpose. The hatch has a purpose._ Locke swallowed. "I don't remember."

Sayid took a step farther into the room. "John?"

"Once," Lock answered. "Once."

"You repeated them once?"

"I said them once."

"And he learned them that quickly?" Sayid asked. "And he entered them?"

"Yes," Locke answered, making every effort to maintain a steady gaze at Sayid as he did so. 

The Iraqi pursed his lips, but he did not respond. Locke wasn't sure whether or not Sayid believed him, but he asked no further questions. The interrogator only turned and left.

Locke watched the man retreat somewhere into the hatch and dropped his head back onto the bunk. He looked up at the bed atop him, and saw etched in the metal that contained it, as if by knife point, a series of tick marks. Had Desmond been counting the weeks? Was this really no more than a monotonous exercise, a psychological experiment that had no salvific purpose? Was Locke's work meaningless?

John Locke punched the top bunk with his fist, and the mattress above rose slightly. He shook the pain from his hands.


	18. Chapter 18

**Chapter 18**

Ana-Lucia was sitting on the couch, using a makeshift cleaning rod to run a white cloth through the barrel of the disassembled gun. The other parts were strewn on the coffee table. She didn't look up when Sayid approached and sat in a chair across from her.

"When was the last time you cleaned this thing?" she asked.

"Charlie had it. Remember?"

Charlie had said he did not know where the guns were, and Sayid believed him. The Englishman must have taken one from the stash before Sawyer had moved it a second time. He hadn't told Sayid, and it had been Ana who first noticed he was carrying. That fact disturbed Sayid. Some time ago, after Boone's death, he had effortlessly identified that Locke had secreted a gun away. Why had he not observed Charlie's? His mind had been too preoccupied of late, and he must cleanse and refocus it.

"Yeah," Ana said.

"What did our prisoner say when I left?"

"Not much. He thanked me."

Sayid nodded with satisfaction. "That is a beginning. I suppose it would be too early to press your advantage now."

"I think so. Give him a day to sit and worry." She started reassembling the gun, snapping the parts together with a loud and angry flourish.

Sayid eyed her as she did so. "You need not be so rough."

"Why? Should I be coquettish like Kate while our fates hang in the balance?"

"I meant," he replied slowly, "with the gun. No need to force the parts."

"I think I can manage to handle a gun, Sayid. I _was _a cop." She finally looked up at him, and, after flipping up the safety, she placed the gun in her waistband.

Sayid leaned forward, his arms resting against his legs. "I believe you should return that to me."

She smiled sardonically. "Charlie had it," she echoed him. "Remember? It's not yours."

He leaned back again into the chair. He looked at the floor, as though he were contemplating whether to press the issue. And then he looked back up at her and said, "I am returning to the beach. Are you staying here?"

"Yeah." She shook her head. "I never would have been a prison guard. I always thought it was a thankless job. But I admired the people who had a skin thick enough to tolerate all that… It's got to be done."

When Sayid did not respond, she continued, "What are going to do if we have more of them? It isn't much of a prison, that vault. It isn't that big."

Sayid appeared confused. "More of them?"

"You know, once we start this…this war."

"It has already been started, but not by us. And there will not be more of them."

"Why do you say that? You don't think we can capture--"

Sayid interrupted her. "Once we know where they are and how many there are, once we pursue them…there will not be one left to imprison."

Ana looked at him wordlessly. She nodded her head ever so slightly, in reluctant agreement. Sayid rose and left the hatch.


	19. Chapter 19

**Chapter 19**

As Sayid passed by Sawyer's tent, he heard the Southerner call out to him. Other than at the council meeting, they hadn't spoken to one another since the fight. The Iraqi turned back and waited with some impatience for Sawyer to make whatever sarcastic gesture the man felt compelled to make.

Sawyer held up a copy of the book he was reading, _The Scarlet Letter_, so that Sayid could see the title. "Listen to this," he said and began quoting: "The founders of a new colony, whatever Utopia of human virtue and happiness they might originally project, have invariably recognized it among their earliest practical necessities to allot a portion of the virgin soil as a cemetery, and another portion as the site of a prison." He put the book down. "Sounds like we're settling in, huh?"

"Are you trying to provoke me?" Sayid asked.

Sawyer could not miss the angry edge in his voice. "What?" he asked with genuine surprise. "Just making conversation--" Sawyer winced and looked away. "Oh, sorry," he said. "I swear, I wasn't even thinking about Shannon. I was thinking about that guy locked up in the hatch--"

Sayid did not let him finish before walking rapidly away. The sand scattered in light clouds beneath his feet. A cemetery and a prison. Those were the first two things. And what was the third? A church. That was what Eko was building now, by all accounts, and Charlie was helping him. The musician had deserted the project Sayid was working on to labor instead beside the priest.

As Sayid began working alone with his stack of bamboo, he considered that perhaps Charlie would not prove as useful as he had once hoped. However angry Charlie may have once felt over Claire's abduction, he was now preoccupied with building the church. He was not nursing his hate. He would not have the fuel that was required to inspire action when the time came. Eko might even urge him to pacifism.

Ana, however, would still have enough indignation—of that Sayid was sure. Perhaps Sawyer would too, if he could be reminded of his former wound. Jack had been ready to storm the Others after the threat to Kate, but where did he stand now? And who else had the will to fight? How, Sayid wondered, was he going to raise an army when the survivors spent their mornings lounging on the beach, their afternoons playing poker, and their evenings flirting by the fire?

He sighed as he tossed a long pole onto a growing pile, and he turned to see who had drawn up behind him. "Good afternoon, Bernard."

Bernard told him of his plan to build an SOS sign and asked for his assistance. Sayid apologized and replied that he was working on another project at the moment.

Bernard looked at the stack of bamboo with consternation. "You're digging in too?" he asked. "I thought you of all people…I heard you worked on the radios, I heard you…"

"I am not discouraging you, Bernard. I will help later if I have the time. But I have more pressing issues to consider. Dim hopes are not my priority."

Bernard's teeth were set on edge as he exhaled a raspy sigh. "Great. Just great. A dim hope? Is that _everyone's _attitude?" The elder gentleman continued to grumble as he walked away.

Sayid had not been working much longer when he felt another figure approach him. Jack came to a standstill and placed his hands on either side of his hips, his gray shirt soaked with sweat from the hike from the hatch. "What are you building?" he asked.

"A table."

"A table?" Jack's laugh sounded like a series of breaths.

"Yes. A table."

"It's a bit…large, don't you think?"

"It needs to seat at least thirteen," Sayid replied, now picking up a rod from the pile and beginning to tie it in line.

Jack's laugh fell again from his lips, mixed with a hint of disdain. "Don't you think you could be building something a little more useful than a table? I mean, we've managed to eat pretty well on the ground."

Sayid violently pulled tight a knot. "And what have you been building recently, Jack?"

Jack bobbed his head and half-smiled, but he defended himself. "I've been treating patients, Sayid. That's what I do."

"And this is what I do. We have had one council meeting. We will need to hold another. It will be easier to see and speak to one another across this table than in a circle around a fire. It will also be easier to spread out maps and draft plans."

"You're building a war table." The tone in Jack's voice was one of disbelief. Was this the same man who had come to Ana and asked her how long it would take to raise an army? Jack, Sayid thought, wanted to play at war but not to plan for it.

"Yes," Sayid answered simply as he went to grasp another piece of bamboo. "Was there something you wanted from me?"

Jack shrugged and looked as if he were rethinking his reason for approaching Sayid. But at last he said, "I'm going into the jungle. I'm going to the line to see if the Others want to do a prisoner exchange. Walt for Gale. Do you want to come with me?"

Sayid tossed the bamboo he was holding back onto the ground and turned slowly to Jack. "No," he answered.

"Why not?"

"Because it is an asinine idea."

Jack let out a scoffing breath. "Want to tell me why?"

"Indeed I do want to tell you why. I heard you beat Sawyer at poker."

"Yeah, what's that got to do—"

"Then you ought to know how foolish it is to tip your hand too early. If you go there, to the line, and you suggest this trade, they will know how little we know. If they take Gale back—and that is an enormous if—we will have lost our only potential source of information."

"Don't you want Walt back?" Jack asked angrily. "Don't you care about the boy? Or is all you care about your own revenge?"

Sayid turned his eyes away from Jack and took a moment to calm himself. "If I thought we could get Walt back that easily, I would support you. But they are not likely to give us Walt. They took the children for a purpose." The Iraqi now turned back to look Jack in the eye. "If you cannot by now perceive how cunning our enemy is--"

"So what, just leave the boy to…to suffer whatever they are doing to him?"

"The best way to get Walt back," said Sayid deliberately, "is to learn more about our enemies. We need to know their numbers and their strength. And then we need to train. We need to pursue our goal as a unit—not in pairs and triplets as we have been doing. _Then _we can recapture _all _of the children." Sayid glanced at his half-formed table. "We are doing it again. All of us. Running around in the jungle without unity or direction. We will accomplish nothing."

"And what do you suggest? You haven't broken Gale. You don't seem likely to. This is something, Sayid, this prisoner exchange. This is at least something!" Jack gestured angrily with his hands towards the jungle. "I'm going in there to the line, and you can either come with me or not."

Sayid shook his head. "I am not coming."

"Fine! I'll get Kate to come. She'll see reason in this."

Sayid shrugged and turned back to the table. "Little doubt she will accompany you, but not necessarily because she considers your plan reasonable."

Jack shook his head one final time and left the Iraqi to his work.


	20. Chapter 20

**Chapter 20**

"Charlie!" Sayid called. The Englishman looked miniscule as he stood two feet away from the towering African, and yet only in frame. Charlie was holding himself now with a self-confidence and a sense of purpose Sayid had not witnessed previously. The soldier's disciple had left him for another master, and Sayid felt strange asking for his service now. "I need your help."

"I'm a bit busy, Sayid," Charlie replied as he bent to grasp a piece of wood. "As you can see."

"I have to cut the table. I cannot do it alone."

Charlie shrugged apologetically and went about his work. "Maybe tomorrow," he said.

Eko glanced at Sayid with that unusual look of his: part threatening firmness, part gentle smile. "Charlie tells me you are building a war table."

"Yes," Sayid answered. "Perhaps you can help me to cut it." He suspected the priest would decline, but he felt compelled to make the suggestion anyway. Eko approached the Iraqi slowly and left Charlie to work on the church. The height difference was uncomfortable for Sayid. He did not care to look up to a standing man, and he had to do it all too often. He sensed Eko had more than usual to say, and so he went and sat on the ground instead, against a tree.

Eko sat across from him. "Do you think it is wise to war against these people?"

"I think it is wise to be ready to war against them." Sayid drew up one leg and rested an arm across his knee. He had known this conversation with the priest must come sooner or later, and he had not been looking forward to it. Days ago, he had told Ana he could recruit Eko, but he had grown increasingly skeptical of the possibility.

"I killed two of them," Eko said. "I beat them to death."

"I know," answered Sayid. "You would make a good soldier, if it came to that kind of hand to hand combat, and it most likely will."

"I regretted my actions."

"I know." At the council meeting, Eko had been asked the subject of his conversation with Gale. He had spoken of his confession, but he had not attempted to explain it to anyone, despite the many uncertain faces. Sayid knew enough of guilt to know how keenly Eko felt it, even if he himself could not comprehend why such an act of necessary, immediate self-defense against such a vicious enemy should breed remorse. "Yet if you had to do it again, would you?"

This question the priest did not answer. Instead, he said, "Jesus told us to love our enemies."

At this Sayid shrugged with his eyebrows, not his shoulders. "Yet he also said, 'I come not to bring peace, but a sword.'"

Eko smiled slightly. Was it an expression of surprise? Condescension? Sayid did not know. "Your Isa bin Maryam is somewhat different from my Christ."

Sayid looked directly at the priest. "He said it in _your _Gospel."

Eko nodded. "He was speaking metaphorically. He was speaking of families ripped apart by conflicting loyalties."

The priest crossed his legs and drew himself up straight. He looked every inch the warrior, Sayid thought. He looked the role more than Sayid himself did, but would Eko be willing to assume it?

The Iraqi said nothing and waited for the man to continue his slow speech. "There is more than one kind of war," said Eko, "and more than one kind of warrior. Soon the day is coming when this family of survivors will likewise be ripped apart by conflicting loyalties."

"And which side will you choose?"

"Whichever side Christ is on."

Sayid drew his bottom lip beneath his teeth and tried to suppress the scoffing sound that threatened to escape his mouth. Then he asked, "And you are privy to that knowledge?"

"I strive to be," Eko replied. "I can only strive." Eko titled his head and seemed to examine the other man's expression. "I do not suggest you are wrong to build your war table or to make your plans. But I cannot promise you what I will do when the time comes. I will do whatever my conscience dictates."

Sayid stood abruptly. "As will we all."

Eko rose and followed him. "Is it your conscience that guides you now, Sayid, or your desire for revenge?"

Sayid answered as he walked away, "What makes you think it cannot be both?"


	21. Chapter 21

**Chapter 21**

When Sayid returned to the hatch that evening, he found Ana-Lucia sitting on the same couch she had occupied earlier in the day, again holding the gun. The slide was locked back, and she was earnestly examining the barrel. Of course she must have done many other things during the day, but he could not help but envision her sitting there hour after hour, caressing and ministering to that gun, and suddenly a foreign, guttural sound escaped his lips.

"What?" she asked, looking up abruptly, her formerly methodical expression now dissolving fast into a defensive cast. "What are you laughing at?"

"Did I laugh?" he asked solemnly. "No, I do not think so."

"You laughed," she assured him, softening a little, the slight ghost of a smile beginning to form on her otherwise peeved face.

"How is our prisoner?"

"Still not eating," she answered. "Does he think he'll earn our sympathy?"

"Not ours," said Sayid.

Ana nodded. "He's been pitting Jack and Locke against one another. I'm going to talk to him again tomorrow."

Now Sayid was the one to nod. He noticed Ana had stopped examining the gun and had begun to examine him.

"You look awful," she said.

"I have been working at a difficult task without assistance. I came to take a shower."

When he was at last alone and free of his sweat-soaked clothes, Sayid opened only the hot water tap. He knew that, even so, the shower would still be lukewarm, but it was better than the cold spray of the caves or the salty, unclean feel of the ocean. As he entered and let the water wash over his hair and face, he leaned with one arm, wearily, against the shower's wall.

He thought about Eko's words, and he thought about how much easier it was to serve than to lead. He wondered who would join the battle if and when it came. The survivors had done nothing to recover Walt, and they had at first left Michael to wander the jungle alone. He himself had not thought of the childless father. He had been too consumed by his own loss.

If this people possessed any will to fight, it was not systematic, and it was born of a spattering of unreliable grudges. Could he form an army from such unstable building blocks? And if they won, and if they escaped the island, what then?

Sayid pushed the suds through his matted hair and, for the first time in what seemed like a long time, considered the possibility of life outside the island. What would he do? Where would he go? He had no family and no country to return to. He had sought one thing for seven years, and one thing alone.

Would he go on to Irvine, after all? Would he seek out Nadia? His first weeks on the island had been consumed by frenetic activity inspired by a burning desire to reach that one destination…yet he had let go of that hope, and he had anchored himself to another, fresher, more tangible love. But that purpose, too, now lay buried, and could he really reclaim an old inspiration, one that had been half fantasy to begin with?

Nadia might be married. Even if she was not, she might have forgotten him. And even if she hadn't, she might not be the idol he had once erected in his imagination. And if there was any of the old love slumbering somewhere in the recesses of his heart, he could not awake it now, nor did he wish to. No emotion seemed capable of piercing the numbness that had encased his soul, save the occasional flash of indignation, the insuppressible but quiet murmuring of grief, or the faint flicker of guilt.

There was no reason to stay on this island, and there was no reason to leave. There was nothing to press onward towards--except war and victory. And it was these last two subjects to which his mind now turned, with some relief, as he rinsed the soap from the rest of his body. War was coming--sooner or later, it was coming, and the strangeness of the present moment struck him suddenly. His enemy had built this shower and had sent the food that he would probably eat before he left the hatch.

Had the survivors been fools to take these things? Sayid had never wanted to open the hatch. He had felt then like the lone voice crying, "Beware of Greeks bearing gifts." Yet now here he stood, taking what small comfort he could from the stream that washed away the dirt and sweat.

But none of these things—not the hatch, not the shower, not the records, not the food—were the spoils of war. It was not as if he was enjoying the loot of his enemies. Yes, the survivors had broken into the hatch; they had, in a sense, captured it. But they had been expected. Dharma had put this here, all of it. And why? And what, if anything, would happen to them if they continued to use it?

Sayid jerked round the nob of the shower until the water ceased. Shivering, he stepped out and abruptly toweled off. Realizing he had forgotten to bring clean clothes, he tied the towel around his waist and walked past an indifferent Ana to the storage closet. There he pulled out a T-shirt and pants. They were white, sterile things, both bearing the Dharma logo. Not knowing quite why, he brought the shirt to his nose and sniffed. The dusty scent told him nothing, of course. He put back the shirt and pants and walked again past the couch. Ana wasn't toying with the gun anymore. She was reading some kind of car magazine. He didn't comment, and neither did she, but she glanced at him with curiosity.

When he reached the laundry room, he threw his dirty clothes into the washer. He added some detergent, mechanically turned the nob, and pressed the button. He leaned back against the wall, crossed his arms over his chest, and stared at nothing as the hypnotic whirring of the machine commenced.


	22. Chapter 22

**Chapter 22**

Sayid did not know how long he stood there, emptying his mind, but it must have been a good twenty minutes, because the washer had stopped. He transferred his clothes to the dryer and decided it would be ridiculous to continue to remain in the confined space near the machines. Despite having nothing to wear but a towel, he made his way back to the living room and sat in a chair. He was too numb to feel awkward, and he picked up a magazine he had no intention of reading.

He felt Ana's curious eyes on him, but he ignored her and mechanically flipped the glossy pages until she spoke.

"So," she said, closing her magazine and tossing it on the table. "Jack's gone to make an exchange. He says he's going to the line to--"

"I know," Sayid abruptly interrupted her, as though he wished to signal an end to the conversation.

"I offered to go with him, but he said I should stay here with Gale." When Sayid did not reply, Ana continued, "Jack wouldn't take me, but he was happy enough to take my gun."

At this Sayid finally looked up, not to Ana, but at the handgun lying on the table. "Yet you still have it."

Ana barely shook her head. "I got another one."

Now Sayid closed his magazine and sat upright. "How did you manage that?"

"Sawyer came by for a shift at the computer," she said, shrugging nonchalantly. "And I convinced him to leave and bring me back one."

"Convinced him?" Sayid asked doubtfully. "How?"

Ana raised her eyes to meet the Iraqi's. She might have appeared amused or even flippant if she had been speaking to anyone else; instead, something checked the levity in her eyes, and, by the time she met his glance, she only looked weary. "I have my methods, just like you have yours."

"Mine failed," Sayid admitted matter-of-factly. "Do you think you could get him to give you the rest of the guns?"

Now it was Ana's turn to admit her limitations. "Nah," she said simply.

Sayid did not ask her why; he did not need to ask. Sawyer could be persuaded to give up a single gun here and there—especially if a pretty woman was the one to ask for it—but he wasn't going to relinquish his power, not to anyone. And, at the moment, Sayid supposed it didn't really matter. There would be a time to train and a time to fight, but now was the time to interrogate, to learn, and to plan. He could worry about the guns another day.

He glanced toward the heavy door behind which sat their prisoner. He felt a sudden sense of powerlessness overwhelm him. Tomorrow, the interrogation would be in the hands of Ana Lucia, and he would have no part of it. Her success or her failure would play a large part in determining the future of the survivors. He was no longer in a position to extract anything useful from the prisoner. He would have to trust her with this momentous task. He would have to trust the woman who had not been able to distinguish friend from foe, who had shot into the darkness ignorant of the precious life she would cut off too soon.

And yet, the strange thing was that he did trust her, as much as he _could _trust someone other than himself. He could not conceive of a person more suited to carry out the interrogation. And he took some comfort in the fact that she at least seemed to share his wariness and his resentment when it came to dealing with the Others.

He didn't have to like Ana to make her an ally, he thought. The time for friendship and human communion was behind him now. He had taken his respite from the flurry of pointed activity; he had passed carefree hours with Shannon, and those hours could never be recaptured.

Now was the time for work.


	23. Chapter 23

**Chapter 23**

While Michael was collapsing in the presence of Jack and Kate, Sayid was winding his way through the jungle back to the beach. It had taken awhile for his clothes to dry, and night had fallen before he could return. Ana had called him a fool for making the nighttime trek alone, and she had been right: the survivors' unguarded ways, from which they still had not departed, were foolish. But he was accustomed to his solitary strolls in the jungle, and he hadn't wanted to sleep in the hatch. He knew that if he stayed, the temptation to supervise Ana's interrogation of Gale would have been too great.

He stopped at Shannon's grave before returning to his tent, but he did not linger long. The nightly ritual never brought him any relief. He went habitually, as if to remind himself that she had been real and that the crucifix struck deep into the ground marked something tangible. It was not merely her death that had hollowed out his soul and left him with a surreal feeling of absence; it was the merciless way that the world moved on, the way the survivors never spoke her name in his presence, the way they lived as if she had never lived.

When the morning came, as indifferently as it always came, Sayid awakened and began to ease the pain of idleness with labor. He could not do anything about the guns or the army or the Others until Ana had discovered the number of their enemy. So he built.

He began to dig a hole in which he planned to insert and store a locked box. It would house the guns once he had obtained them from Sawyer. He would parcel them out for training as needed and return them to safety each night. He didn't need the hole, really; the box would be enough, but the hole would keep the guns nearby and yet out of the way. And it was something to do.

Hurley approached him and made light conversation, and Sayid responded readily enough, even though he always found the big man's dialogue to be slightly cryptic. Hurley was asking for the Iraqi's assistance with Libby, and Sayid could not help but think the man's ideas of courtship were a little bizarre. Hurley attempted to explain himself, and Sayid at last grasped the gist of his meaning.

The Iraqi did not smile, but he felt for Hurley an affinity mingled with pity. After Shannon's death, when they had conversed in the hatch Sayid had goaded Hurley to seize the day. The young man finally seemed to be taking the gamble, but he also seemed to be at quite a loss.

Sayid now suggested the beautiful stretch of beach where he had once taken Shannon for a picnic. He felt no protective jealousy of the place. Indeed, his spirit even lightened a little when he considered that someone else might benefit from his discovery in the same pleasant way he had. If Hurley brought Libby there, it would be further proof that those days had not been a mere dream.

Sayid found himself saying, "I took Shannon there once," and it felt like he was shedding a burden by saying her name and recalling her to another person. He waited for Hurley to reply, to ask something about her or about their encounter there on the beach, but the burly man only grew suddenly awkward and conspicuously taciturn.

Sayid went back to digging his hole.


	24. Chapter 24

**Chapter 24**

Sayid was making his way along the beach to the jungle when Jack encountered him. "I need to speak with you," the doctor insisted, and the Iraqi stopped and waited. Jack let out a trembling sigh. He wasn't looking forward to sharing this news with Sayid, with whom he had already had so many tactical disagreements. It was awkward standing there, so Jack suggested they continue walking as they spoke. "Henry Gale has escaped," he said at last.

Sayid stopped still and glanced at the doctor. "Escaped?" he asked. "How? I left Ana in the hatch with--"

"Ana Lucia is dead. So is Libby. Ana must have gone in to interrogate him. Gale grabbed her gun, shot her and then Libby, and then he shot Michael in the arm."

"Michael?"

"Yeah. Kate and I found Michael when we went to the line."

Sayid shook his head as if clearing it. "And when were you and Kate planning to tell the rest of the camp that he had returned?"

"Look, Sayid, you know how things happen here…"

The Iraqi sighed. "Yes. Yes I do," and then he began walking faster toward the jungle.

"Where are you going?" Jack asked as he hastened to keep up.

"To the hatch to speak to Michael…to find out what happened."

Jack nodded, behind him, turned, and headed back down the beach.

"And where are you going?" Sayid called after him.

"To get the guns. They've been buried in Sawyer's shelter all along. Michael says the Others are not heavily armed, that there are fewer of them than us, and that they have Walt. We're going after them."

Sayid's eyes widened at this bit of information, and he felt a momentary stab of self-reproach for not having guessed the location. He did not bother to ask how Jack had discovered the firearms, however. "Get the guns, but do not make any decisions until I return from the hatch," insisted Sayid. "We need to have another council meeting."

Jack began walking back in the Iraqi's direction. "What is there to discuss, Sayid? We know what they've done. We know they have the kids."

"Michael disappears for days and returns without warning. When he returns, Gale escapes, and two people die. Gale manages to deliver fatal shots to Libby and Ana, but not to Michael. Did you consider that Michael might have been compromised? Did you consider that he might not be revealing the full truth?"

"Why would he lie to us?"

"He is a father. At the moment, he has only one priority."

"What are you suggesting?" Jack asked, a defensive tone creeping into his voice. The truth was that Jack had his own questions about Michael's story. Michael description of the clothing of the Others matched Kate's description of the costumes she found in the hatch. Why would the Others be wearing their costumes when there was no one around to terrify? Did they wear them all the time? Did they know Michael would be watching them? The whole situation was baffling, but Michael himself Jack did not doubt. Michael was one of them.

"I am suggesting that I talk with Michael now and that we hold another council meeting this evening. In a few days, we take action, if action is to be taken."

"A few days!" exclaimed Jack.

"Would you have these people attack the Others without any training whatsoever?" Sayid waved his hand in frustrated dismissal. "We will discuss it tonight. Just move the guns so Sawyer does not."

Jack put a hand on either hip and nodded his head in exasperation. "So you trust me to do that, do you?"

Sayid only looked at him wearily before continuing to the hatch.

Hurley was the first person Sayid observed upon entering the hatch. The young man was sitting on the couch, leaning forward with his arms against his knees, and starring vacantly at the table. Sayid sat across from him. "I am sorry," he said simply.

Hurley looked up at him, the tears held back in his eyes, his mouth a near taunt line. Sayid would almost have thought the man was angry, if he had ever seen Hurley angry. "Why did you have to suggest a picnic?" Hurley asked bitterly.

Sayid appeared baffled. "What…I do not understand…"

"If you hadn't suggested a picnic, I wouldn't have forgotten the blankets, and she wouldn't have gone back…she wouldn't have…" Hurley stood up abruptly and began to approach Sayid, who likewise rose quickly to prepare himself for whatever was coming.

"Hurley…" Sayid said cautiously.

The man was too much of a teddy bear to be intimidating, but his bulk was significant and almost menacing as he approached Sayid and shoved him angrily. Sayid fell back a step and nearly tripped down into the chair again, but he steadied himself. Hurley came at him again, both palms splayed flat for another shove. Again Sayid bore the brunt of the push without staggering over, but he did not respond. He held his hands up and out at his sides, as though to indicate that he had no intention of fighting back, and this time Hurley punched him across the face; it was a much harder hit than the Iraqi had expected. Yes, the man was big, but somehow Sayid had envisioned Hurley as being too timid to throw a painful punch. Sayid rubbed his jaw, and, when the pain began to subside a little, he asked, "Does this help you?"

Hurley looked horrified at what he had done, and he stumbled backwards into a sitting position on the couch. He buried his face in his hands and murmured, "I'm sorry, I'm sorry. It wasn't your fault. It was all my fault. It was all my fault. I forgot the blankets. How could I forget the blankets!"

"The fault belongs only to Gale," Sayid said softly, although he wasn't entirely sure that Gale had acted alone. "Where is Michael?"

Hurley took one hand from his face and pointed left. Sayid followed and found the man starring at the blank computer screen. Michael jumped when he felt Sayid's presence, and he turned quickly. "Hey, man," he said, and Sayid could hear the nervous strain in the father's voice.

"I need to speak with you," replied Sayid, as he pulled up a chair to sit beside him.

Michael lowered his eyes, and Sayid lowered his head to capture them. "We are all glad you made it back alive," he said.

"Yeah, yeah," said Michael, relaxing a little, and raising his eyes to meet Sayid's. But soon enough he was looking away again.

"So what happened to Ana and Libby? And what happened to you?"

Now Michael looked Sayid directly in the eyes as he rehearsed the same story he had told Jack and Kate.


	25. Chapter 25

**Chapter 25**

Sayid listened intently to Michael's story and then asked him where Jack had lain the bodies. Both were in the vault, wrapped in blankets and awaiting burial. Sayid's emotions, when he uncovered Ana, were difficult to define. There was a fierce stab of memory as he recalled holding a dead love in his arms; there was the guilty, only half-suppressed sense of poetic justice; there was pity for a life cut off before it could achieve the same peace he still restlessness sought; and there was the cold certainty that war and further death was now inevitable.

He carefully removed Ana's hands from the spot where Jack had folded them and examined the entry wound. He then uncovered Libby and made the same examination, and he thought with sympathy of Hurley, still sitting on the couch, hands still buried in his face. Sayid was no doctor and no detective, but he had learned one thing, at least, from looking at the bodies: Henry Gale had shot to kill and not to wound.

Sayid returned to Michael, sat in the chair across from him, and said, "You do not know this, but the man we had imprisoned there—who called himself Henry Gale--had an opportunity to escape some days ago when he was alone in the hatch with Locke. Yet he did not. Why do you suppose that is?"

"How could I know?" answered Michael, and it did not require Sayid's advanced skills as interrogator to perceive that the man was nervous.

"He shot Ana and Libby both in the chest. Yet he only shot you in the arm. Why do you suppose that is?"

"I…" Michael stuttered. "Ana must have been closer to him, and Libby…I don't know. I didn't see him shoot them."

Sayid leaned forward in his chair and caught Michael's eye, forcing the man to either look at him or look away. Michael looked away. "I know you are desperate to rescue your son. And I want to help you to do that, Michael. I _will _help you to do that. But how can I help if you withhold the truth from me?"

"Look," said Michael, "I don't know what you think, but I am telling you the truth about how many of them I saw and how…"

"Michael." To the father, Sayid's tone was unexpectedly sympathetic. "Michael, I _will _help you."

Michael sighed heavily. He knew he could not convince Sayid of his story now. And if Sayid told the rest of the survivors, what might they decided to do to him? The father found a partial truth bursting out from somewhere inside like a great, cleansing wave of relief. "They said…they said you had a prisoner here, and if I freed him, they would return Walt."

Sayid was so satisfied to have broken Michael so easily that he was not watching the man's eyes as he continued, "So I let him out of the vault. I had no idea he was going to shoot anybody. I'm so sorry." And Michael _was _sorry. He had not intended to kill anyone, but there had been no other way to free Gale without discovery, no other way to spare his son. And yet he had been discovered nonetheless. However guilty he felt, Michael could not let his fellow survivors know the extent of his crime. If he did, they would never help him rescue Walt.

Sayid was now rubbing his temple and considering what must be done with Michael for his role in the plot. The man had only been trying to save his son; he had only been attempting the same prisoner exchange Jack had attempted. But two had died in the process. And there were those who might desire retribution.

Michael persisted, "But what I am telling you about the Others is true. They are not heavily armed. There are not many of them."

"If they are going to return Walt anyway, why do you want us to attack?"

Michael looked away. It was a very good question. And suddenly he realized that he was never going to get the survivors to attack until that question was answered. And he could not answer it. He lowered his hands into his head and then raised it angrily again. Now hopeless, he let yet more truth role off his tongue. "They don't have Walt," he admitted. "The scientists in charge have Walt. And they want to observe whether you can be convinced to attack the Others and what will happen if you do."

"But we believe the Others _are_ Dharma. Kate discovered a hatch that contained costumes and theatrical paint--"

"The Others _were _Dharma," Michael explained. "They were scientists. But the initiative took its toll on them, and they…went native so to speak. The scientists who still continue to believe in the project, who still carry it out--they have Walt, and they were the ones who made the deal with me. I was captured, knocked out, and taken somewhere. I was put in a closed off room. They brought me Walt and showed him to me through a window. I don't where I was. They proposed the deal with me, and then…then they injected me with something, and I was unconscious again. I lost a lot of time. But while I was wandering along the beach, I _did _find the camp of the Others, and they were just like I said, except their clothes are really no more tattered than our own. But they _are _less heavily armed than us, and their camp is much less developed, much more crude than ours. They are new at this…surviving."

"Then the Dharma scientists are our true enemy," insisted Sayid. "They are the ones who keep us here, who manipulate us like lab rats. The Others are deserters. They took Walt in the beginning for the initiative, but then they deserted. That's why Kate found that other hatch abandoned. And now they live here on this island as if it were their home."

"I guess." Michael shrugged. "That's all I know."

"Why do you believe Dharma will keep its end of the bargain?" Sayid asked.

"Because I have to believe."

-------------------------

When the twelve gathered at Sayid's war table that evening after the burials of Ana and Libby, the mood was more than somber. One had been added to the council, but two had been forever lost. Michael now publicly recounted the information he had delivered to Sayid, again apologizing and insisting it had been Gale who had fired the shots. He saw Hurley's nose and lips twitch and watched him clench his fists against the table. The big man raised his angry eyes toward Michael, but he made no threatening gesture. He only stared at the father for a moment and then turned away, toward Sayid, who shook his head.

Eko and Locke, who had by now returned, told of their discovery of the hatch beneath the plane. Locke spoke reluctantly and with a sense of disillusionment.

Jack proposed that they arm themselves and seek out the camp of the Others. Deserters or not, they were once Dharma scientists, and they might have the information the survivors needed to find those who were manipulating them and to free themselves from the island. "I say we go after the Others, and the sooner the better," he concluded.

Eko, however, shook his head. "I will not participate. We have a purpose here. I believe Michael—and perhaps all of us—have misjudged Dharma. We should remain here, continuing our important work at the hatch."

"One of Dharma killed Libby!" Hurley interjected. "How can you say we've misjudged them?"

"I cannot explain," said Eko in a deep tone coursing with both sympathy and confidence, "but I do not think Dharma did the killing."

At this pronouncement Michael looked abruptly down, but Sayid did not notice his reaction, because he himself was directing a baffled look at Eko.

"You believe in this initiative?" asked Charlie in disbelief. "_You? _You would bow down to these false idols and blindly follow their word? First you stop building the church, and now this?"

"This is my fate," Eko said. "God has lead me here. How else can all the coincidences be explained? No man could manufacture such coincidence. No man could send me visions. Yes, Dharma is no more than a human organization, but for whatever reason, God wants me to push that button."

Sawyer released a long whistle and rolled his eyes. The other survivors looked at Eko with varying degrees of wariness. Locke let out an exasperated breath of air. "As I said before, it ought to be obvious by now that the button is nothing but a psychological experiment, just as Libby originally suggested. Everything that has happened here has been guided. It's all been meaningless."

"Just because it is guided does not make it meaningless," Eko insisted. "Quite the contrary."

Locke shook his head. "I'm joining the army. I'm not wasting another second of my life in that hatch." Locke had felt pressed down by the great weight of a shattered faith, but now he was beginning to think that he had the chance to do something purposeful by tracking down the Others and eventually attacking Dharma, the way he had once been of use when he had provided boar for the survivors before he had abandoned the hunt for the hatch.

"Well, whether or not we're human guinea pigs," Sawyer drawled, "these people aren't exactly our friends." He shrugged. "If there's an army, I guess I'm ready to join it."

The discussion—and the arguments—continued for another hour. In the end, the majority agreed to seek out the camp of the Others. They would not attack as Dharma wished them to, but they would enter armed and they would exact what information they could. Then they would find the last hatch where the scientists of Dharma sat playing God. They would recapture the children, and they would find out how they had been brought here and how to escape.

Jack wanted to leave the next morning, as did Michael, but Sayid insisted that he first be given twenty-four hours to train the survivors in the use of firearms. Though their intention was not to war with the Others, misunderstanding might create the necessity of defense. Even if it did not, they would eventually go on to seek out Dharma, and the survivors must know how to use their weapons when that hour arrived. A day was not enough time to train, but it was the only compromise Sayid could secure.

In the end, nine members of the council decided to join the army, with Sayid leading it. Eko refused to join, preferring to remain to push the button. Claire would stay behind with Aaron, and Jin insisted that Sun likewise remain safe on the beach. But this time, Sun could not convince her husband to refrain from doing what he felt to be his duty. Even Hurley insisted on joining the army. His suggestion was greeted by a snicker from Sawyer, who quickly suppressed the instinctive sound when the warning eyes of his fellow survivors fell upon him.

"I am sure we will find a use for you, Hurley," Sayid assured the young man, knowing how important it must be to Hurley to feel a part of whatever vengeance was to be meted out on the tribe of Henry Gale. Sayid hoped to secure at least ten more for the army from among those survivors who had not attended the council meeting, and when the council members departed to their various shelters, he and Jack began the arduous process of recruitment.


	26. Chapter 26

**Chapter 26**

A fifteen man army was assembled by morning, and the training began at the crack of dawn. There were enough guns for each person to carry both a rifle and a handgun, and Sun helped to fashion belts to carry knives and extra magazines. By mid-afternoon, Sayid's patience was wearing thin, and his frustration was growing.

Locke approached him and suggested breaking up the army into groups of four, with Kate training one group, Locke another, and Sayid the third. Sayid consented to the suggestion, and the division of labor did improve matters. It also meant that if they had to divide to conquer, each group would have formed a bond from their afternoon of training.

When night fell, the would-be soldiers retreated to their tents and slept as best they could. In the morning, those who were leaving bid their final farewells to those who would stay behind, and the fifteen-strong army set out to interrogate the twenty-some Others, following Michael's lead toward their camp.

Sayid insisted on camping for the night, though Michael assured him that, if they pressed on, they would be at the Others' camp in a matter of hours. But Sayid thought their weariness from a full day of hiking would negatively offset any benefit they would obtain from the element of surprise, and, in the end, Michael conceded.

As Sayid took his shift standing guard over the slumbering camp, Hurley approached him and insisted on relieving him. "I can't sleep anyway," he said.

"Nor can I," replied Sayid. "Not at the moment, anyway. Let us keep one another company."

Hurley nodded and leaned back against a tree, and Sayid thought for a moment that the big man had snapped a fallen branch on the ground. It was only a second, however, before he realized the sound was the cocking of a gun, but by the time he had identified the location, a man had already stepped from the shadows and had placed a barrel against the side of Hurley's head.

Sayid heard the approach of another figure and whirled to raise his rifle straight into the face of an armed woman, who stood motionlessly before him, holding her gun at the level of his chest. In the meantime, two other men stepped from behind the trees and pointed their guns at the nearest sleeping hostages they could find: Jack and Kate.

The woman who stood in a face-off with Sayid spoke, and Sayid instantly recognized the voice as one he had heard that day when they had searched for the balloon. The Germans had returned, but this time with a fourth.

By now, the rest of the camp was stirring. And when individuals began to reach for their guns, the new, fourth German spoke in his accented English: "Do not move, or we will kill your friends." The survivors froze in place. The man then asked, "Who is in charge?" and Sayid and Jack answered simultaneously, "I am." Locke looked from one to the other quietly.

But it was Sayid to whom the German spoke. "At first we thought you might be with Dharma. But we have been watching you since we first encountered you in the jungle. You are the subjects, aren't you? You were part of that plane crash, and now you are planning to attack Dharma."

"Who are you?" Sayid asked, not looking at the speaker but at the woman who still held him at gunpoint.

"We are not your enemies," said the man. "We are scientists. Eight of us were hired by Dharma to come here to engage in an important experiment. But we did not know the subject of the experiment or the means. When we arrived, some of us were…displeased with the institution's methods, and we refused to cooperate. We were taken to re-education sessions, and four of us came to agree with the Dharma initiative. The remaining four of us pretended to until we could escape into the jungle. Apparently, we were neither the first nor the last scientists to so desert the project. There are others on this island."

Kate, struggling to a sitting position and running a hand through her tangled hair, said, "We know. We've encountered them. But why did Dharma take the children? Why did they take some of us and not others?"

The German, not relinquishing his hold on his gun, explained, "Dharma has taken those it considers impressionable and easily reformed: your children and certain select survivors, those they think will serve well as a new generation of scientists loyal to the initiative, scientists who can one day replace the current members of Dharma. Outside recruits such as ourselves have proven…unreliable."

Sayid now lowered his gun and turned away from the woman and towards the man. "What is the nature of the experiment?"

"It is psychological and sociological. The Dharma initiative seeks to uncover the source of humankind's tendency to descend into chaos and violence and to correct it—to refashion the minds and hearts of men. So Dharma studies those whom the scientist in charge considers fallen. Dharma scientists catalogue how you react to uncertainty, to hardship, and to deception. The goal, in effect, is to stamp out original sin." The German smiled wryly. "So far, it has not worked."

"And where is the man in charge of the project?" Sayid asked. "Where is _he_?"

Locke now broke into the conversation as he drew himself into a sitting position. "Is he in Dharma's sixth station?"

The German's mouth twisted into a grimace. "No. He is beyond it." He then motioned with his rifle. "Come, follow me," he said to Sayid. "You can bring your gun if you like." Sayid glanced at his fellow survivors but followed the German away from the camp.

As they walked, Sayid asked him, "The sickness, is it real?"

The German replied, "There is no sickness in the sense that you mean. The scientist in charge believes that the tendency of human beings to slay one another is a sickness, and he believes he can correct it. Earlier test subjects have all turned on and killed one another. New test subjects are continually brought in. Eventually, he believes he can condition a group of people to respond to any situation, however uncertain, without violence."

"Yet Claire—one of the plane crash survivors--recalls having been kidnapped and inoculated while pregnant."

"Yes, the scientist in charge ordered that. He believes he has finally created a drug that can alter the brain chemistry of infants and unborn children to make them…how shall I say it? Nonviolent. He will be observing the baby as it grows. This is the first time the medicine has been used."

As their hike continued, the German asked Sayid, "Did you wonder how the rain could suddenly stop and start without warning? Did you wonder how there could be polar bears? Did you wonder how your plane could crash here and yet you could see no other plane fly overhead for weeks and weeks?"

"Of course," Sayid answered.

"Let me show you why."

They had by now walked for almost a mile, and they stopped at a clearing in the jungle where the trees did not form a canopy. Instead, the night sky could be viewed clearly. "This is the only spot on the entire island from which you can see it," the German said, and he pointed upwards with his gun.

Sayid's eyes followed the direction of the gun, up to the dark sky. He blinked when he saw the strange constellation. He tried to decipher its form, and at length he realized he was staring up at the Dharma logo. Beneath it, spelled out in the twinkling lights that passed for stars, was written: "Station 6 of 6."

"You may attack the Dharma scientists if you like," said the German quietly. "But that attack will not free you from this hatch. This hatch can only be opened from the outside, by remote control, by the man in charge. The entire environment is manufactured. When a plane flies overhead, it sees only a blanket of fog. But when your plane flew overhead, the doors were opened, and the co-pilot, who was an agent of Dharma, brought the plane down. It was not supposed to explode or splinter in two. It was supposed to have a rough landing but ultimately a safe one. No one was supposed to die. He must have lost control."

Sayid drew his eyes away from the stark truth written in the sky and murmured, "There must be a way to escape."

"No, but there _is _a way to survive. The four of us will join your army, and we will join your camp. When you have regained the children and those who are still of their own free minds, return to your home on the beach. Abandon the hatch and the button and all the things that Dharma would use to manipulate you. Build your society. The scientist who put this project into motion," he pointed upward to the sky, "constructed this immense hatch, but he himself has never set foot in it. He will not open the doors to the hatch to let you out. But nor will he destroy you. He will only let you destroy yourselves."

Again Sayid's eyes wandered upward to the hopeless constellation above, and he recalled how Jack had once said, _We're surviving, let's go on surviving._

Yes, Sayid thought, until they could find a way to scale the immense height of this enormous laboratory, until they could find a way to break through the ceiling that appeared to them as a sky, they must go on surviving.

**The End**


End file.
